2 indicted over January murder of Arab crime boss

State prosecutors have charged two young men with the murder of Tira crime boss Marwan Nasser earlier this year.

The two defendants — Tira resident Hamze Haskiya, 20, and Taybeh resident Saber Masarwa, 24 — are charged with aggravated murder and arson.

According to the indictment, the defendants and their accomplices plotted to kill Nasser as part of a dispute between rival gangs. They were responsible for driving the assailants away from the crime scene in two separate getaway cars.

Equipped with a pistol and an AK-47, the defendants and their accomplices waited outside Nasser’s home overnight, January 8-9. When he arrived home in his car, two of the other accomplices ran towards him and shot him 36 times at close range. The assailants then fled the scene on foot, reached the defendants in the two getaway cars, and drove off.

The defendants are said to have later set fire to one of the cars in an attempt to cover their tracks.

The pair fled to a hotel in Tel Aviv, then to the West Bank. Prosecutors say there are additional suspects still at large.

Nasser’s murder in early January marked this year’s first homicide in Arab society. Some 94 other Arab Israelis have been killed in violent criminal incidents since then, according to the Abraham Initiatives watchdog.

The 51-year-old crime boss had spent over a decade in prison on counts of extortion, money laundering and discharge of a firearm, Haaretz reported at the time of his murder. After his release from jail in 2019, Nasser tried to regain control over businesses in Tira, reigniting a bloody gang war in the city.

Prosecutors are requesting that the two defendants be kept in detention until the end of proceedings against them.