JERUSALEM: Car bombs and gun attacks killed five members of Israel’s Arab minority Sunday, the latest violence to hit a community that has already recorded more than 140 deaths this year.
Criminal violence has escalated among Israel’s Arab minority in recent years, where gangs extort residents and business owners for protection and frequently kill those who fail to pay.
In Jaffa, part of the Tel Aviv municipal area, a car bomb killed a man in his 40s, police and emergency services said, while Israeli news reports reported that the blast left the man’s six-year old son injured.
“The background is criminal,” the police said.
A second car bomb struck in Holon, south of Tel Aviv, severely injuring a man who later died at hospital, the force said.
The victim had been known to police for his involvement in disputes, Tel Aviv police district commander Major General Haim Sargarof told journalists.
A man was shot dead and another injured in the Arab-majority town of Taybeh in central Israel, in what the police described as “apparently a family dispute.”
Hours later, two more men were gunned down in the nearby town of Qalansawe, emergency service Magen David Adom reported.
“A preliminary inquiry indicates that the background to the incident is apparently a family feud,” police said.
Violent crime among Israel’s Arab minority has reached unprecedented levels in recent years, as the community grapples with criminal gangs, easy access to firearms and what it complains is a lack of police enforcement.
Sunday’s bloodshed pushed the toll of Arab citizens killed in such violence to 142 so far this year, according to the Abraham Initiatives, an Israeli NGO promoting Arab minority inclusion — an 11 percent rise over the same period last year.
If the current rate continues, Israel looks set to surpass the record 252 killings among its Arab citizens recorded in 2025.
Arab Israelis, descendants of Palestinians who stayed on their land after Israel’s creation in 1948, comprise around 21 percent of Israel’s population of more than 10 million.
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