Dimona man charged with murder of neighbor who asked him not to curse near synagogue

A man from the southern city of Dimona was charged Sunday with the murder of a neighbor who asked him to stop screaming expletives outside a synagogue.

According to the indictment, as Eliyahu Hazan arrived at the synagogue for evening prayers on September 24, he was berated with “various curses” by Sharon Sanker, 45, who was walking on a nearby street.

Hazan, 59, then approached Sanker and “cursed him back while asking him to cease his behavior,” a statement from the State Attorney’s Office said.

“At the same time, the accused pulled out a sharp object, stabbed the deceased deep in the belly and ran away from the scene, while leaving the deceased to bleed to death,” the statement alleged.

First responders called to the scene took Hazan to Soroka hospital in Beersheba, but he was declared dead on the way.

Sanker, who the Ynet news site reported is mentally ill, was caught shortly after the incident. Prosecutors said they would request that he be kept in custody until the end of the legal proceedings.

“In the indictment it is noted that the accused, with his actions, indifferently caused the deceased’s death,” the statement said.

Neighbors of Hazan said that Sanker, who lived nearby, would threaten him and even attacked him near his home two weeks before the killing. They also told Ynet that he had explicitly stated his intention to murder Hazan the day of the stabbing.