Mohammed Halabi, 69, an inmate who, alongside his brother Mahmoud, carried out a brutal murder spree that shocked Israel 37 years ago, died on Monday due to health reasons. Details regarding his medical condition remain private.
Halabi’s killing spree was discovered on October 20, 1989, during the holiday of Sukkot. In total, Halabi’s victims included two men, one Jewish and one Arab, and five women, both Jewish and Arab.
Police officers arrived at an apartment on 6 Reshit Hochma Street in Tel Aviv’s Shapira neighborhood after receiving reports of a foul smell coming from inside.
Entering the apartment, the officers encountered a horrific scene: three naked bodies, two women and one man, piled on top of one another with electrical cords wrapped around their necks.
The victims were Miriam Abbas, 32, from Acre; Mazal Suisa, 40; and Ali Hussein, 65, who had been homeless and had moved into the apartment shortly beforehand. The murders were believed to have taken place several days earlier.
That same evening, four additional bodies were discovered in Halabi’s apartment on Yehuda Hayamit Street in Jaffa.
Carmela Yahia, 37, the apartment owner who was involved in drugs; Orly Hakim, 21, a drug user; Sabriya Turq, 21, a boxing champion who entered the apartment after hearing screams and was murdered to silence her; and Meir Cohen, 34, a known drug addict.
The bodies were found naked and embracing one another, bearing clear signs of strangulation.
The two brothers were arrested shortly after: Mahmoud on October 23, and Mohammed not much later.
Financial, nationalist motives for killings
The two grew up with their father, a trader who frequented the flea market, and were very familiar with the neighborhoods. Mohammed worked as a security guard and as a Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) informant.
He claimed he killed Abbas over a prostitution-related debt and murdered the others to prevent them from testifying against him. An indictment was filed on December 1, 1989, and the judges sentenced the brothers to seven life sentences on seven counts of murder.
The brothers’ motives were considered to be a combination of financial disputes involving prostitution and drugs, alongside later claims of a nationalist motive.
According to those claims, some of the murders of Jewish victims were intended to prove that Mohammed was no longer an informant, in an effort to join Hamas like his brother. The Turq family waged a lengthy legal battle seeking recognition of that claim, but Mohammed was convicted solely on criminal charges, and no nationalist-security motive was proven.