The father of the gunman who attacked a pub on Tel Aviv’s Dizengoff Street last Friday has been arrested, along with five members of the family, after two of the shooter’s brothers were taken into custody on Saturday.
Muhammad Milhem was the one who identified his son, Nashet Milhem, 31, as the shooter when he saw video footage of the attack on a broadcast last weekend. The elder Milhem is a security guard and auxiliary police officer; it was his weapon the gunman stole and used in the attack.
The younger Milhem shot and killed two people and wounded eight others last Friday, and traumatized many others. Last Saturday police searched the Milhem family home in the northern Israeli Arab town of Ar’ara in Wadi Ara.
Two of the shooter’s brothers were arrested as suspected accessories in the attack. One was taken to a judge at the Haifa Magistrate’s Court the same evening, where his remand was extended by five days.
Tuesday morning, Milhem’s father and five other family members were taken into custody and arrested as well.
“This is police impotency,” family attorney Nachmi Feinblatt was quoted by Israel’s Channel 2 television news as saying. “In the end, they arrested the entire family.”
Nashet Milhem is still at large; he is armed with the submachine gun he used in the attack, and the public is being warned that he is considered dangerous.
Security personnel are focusing most of their search on the northern Tel Aviv suburb of Ramat Aviv. That is where Milhem worked for nearly a decade in a vegetable store, and where he was last reported being seen by residents.