Anan Luabana, a 44-year-old Arab man, was shot dead in Nazareth on Sunday night, as were anther four members of Arab communities over the weekend. 67 Israeli Arabs were murdered in their own communities since the start of 2019.
The weekend’s four murder victims were Adib Deerawi, 38, Iad Badir, 36, Ibrahim Sa’adi, 43 and Bian Bushkar, 22, who was pregnant. Sa’adi and Bushkar were gunned down at a wedding they attended in the town of Basmat Tabun, in northern Israel.
Bushkar hit by a stray bullet while protecting her baby daughter. Her family said she had nothing to do with the gangs who perpetrated the violence, she was simply “in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Police have been struggling to enforce law and order in Arab communities, where there are thousands of illegal weapons which perpetuate gun violence.
In the first half of 2019, police have seized 3,661 weapons, 80% of which were found in Arab communities.
Police have also arrested 2,704 suspects in shooting incidents, and hundreds of them have been indicted. But as many as half the murders committed in Israel’s Arab communities since January have not been solved.
Jamal Hakroush, a senior police commander who also heads the Committee for Law Enforcement in Arab Communities, said that police have been making a great deal of effort to curb violence in Arab communities, but a substantial change would take time.
“The things that haven’t been done for decades won’t suddenly materialize in one year,” Hakroush said.
He added that “in the last two years, we have established new police stations, and the change is starting to show. Wherever police presence is not strong, the criminals are, which is why we need to be on the streets of Arab communities. That is our plan, and we will continue to implement it.”