The Tel Aviv District Court convicted Wednesday 22-year-old Valery Malnachik of stabbing to death Leonid Yardilov, after Malnachik confessed to the killing within the framework of a plea bargain.

According to the deal, Malnachik admitted to killing the 17-year-old in exchange for the charge against him to be reduced from murder to manslaughter. For its part, the prosecution requested the court sentence him to between five to eight years jail time.

During an altercation last February, two groups of young men from Netanya quarreled after one of the youths made a comment about another's girlfriend.

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The sides met later to settle accounts, when they began to fight and Malnachik brandished a knife and then stabbed Yardilov, who was fatally wounded and died shortly afterwards.

Roytal Savid, Malnachik's attorney, said Wednesday that the stabbing was an act of self-defense, and that "the deceased and his friends initiated the quarrel, and came to the scene to attack the defendant's friends."

Savid argued that Malnachik was protecting his friend when he was attacked by three youths, after which he pulled out the blade.

Lara Tzinman, one of the heads of the Israel Organization of Parents of Murdered Children, said Wednesday the group opposes plea bargains "which are know as deals with the devil."

Tizman continued, "In our eyes it is better to risk loosing a conviction instead of giving a murderer the pleasure of confessing in return for a lesser punishment, which does not in any way reflect the gravity of the offence.

It is important to give the victim's family the right to express their position on the sentencing," Tzinman added.