Arab women disproportionately victims of murder in 2024, watchdog report says

The Israel Observatory on Femicide releases its annual report on the killing of women, noting that Arabs have been disproportionately killed in 2024.

There have been 20 women killed in Israel in 2024 so far, a similar murder rate to last year, the watchdog says.

The organization says half of the women murdered this year in Israel so far were Arabs, including Bedouin, while one victim was Druze. Eight of the victims were Jewish and two had foreign citizenship.

Arab women were disproportionately victims, given that the community makes up 21 percent of the population.

The report finds that in the vast majority of cases, the victim knew her killer or suspected killer — in half the cases it was her husband. In many other cases the suspects were other family members, including sons and brothers.

Just 20 percent of the victims had approached the authorities for help amid domestic violence prior to their killing.

The Israel Observatory on Femicide says that a number of the killings are linked to the criminal gangs, with “a probability that the female victims were targeted since they were an ‘asset’ or the ‘property’ of men from underworld gangs in the Arab sector.”

Prof. Shalva Weil of the Israel Observatory on Femicide calls for the government to take action.

“The heinous crime of femicide, the murder of women in Israeli society just because they are women, continues this year unabated, both among Jews and among Israeli Arabs. The vast majority of the victims knew the perpetrators, who were husbands, partners and even brothers,” Weil says.

“In addition, women were murdered in Israel as a result of fights between warring gangs. The government has to pay attention to the plight of women in society, even if a war is raging,” she says.