Underworld feud or Hamas initiation test? The chilling secret behind the murder of 7 young people in Tel Aviv
A profile article about police officer Ephraim 'Kremeshnit' Ehrlich, describing how he cracked the 1994 murder of seven young people in a Jaffa apartment. Ehrlich connected a report of three bodies on Reishit Chochma Street with prior information about a debt, leading to a raid on an apartment on Yehuda Hayamit Street where seven bodies were found. The suspect, Muhammad Halabi, fled to Gaza, was arrested, and sentenced to seven life terms. The article also touches on the controversy surrounding the motive: a financial dispute or a nationalist background.
An extensive profile article about police officer Ephraim 'Kremeshnit' Ehrlich, describing how he cracked the 1994 case of the murder of seven young people in an apartment on Yehuda Hayamit Street in Jaffa. Ehrlich, who served in the Tel Aviv District Investigations Unit, heard on the radio about three bodies found in an apartment at 6 Reishit Chochma Street. The address triggered a memory: he recognized it as the apartment of Miriam Abbas, a woman who had previously told him about a debt. Ehrlich convinced his commander to assign him a detective, Superintendent Dudi Barak, and the two set out to investigate. They arrested a person in an apartment on Wasserman Street, who provided details about a meeting and led them to the apartment at 4 Yehuda Hayamit Street. In the apartment, Ehrlich and Barak found rags stuffed between the door and the frame, and inside they discovered seven bodies. The suspect, Muhammad Halabi, a drug dealer, fled to the Gaza Strip, was arrested with the cooperation of the IDF's Shimshon unit, and was sentenced to seven life terms. The article touches on the controversy surrounding the motive: alongside financial disputes in the prostitution and drug world, claims arose that the murders were intended to serve as a 'proof of loyalty' to Hamas for Halabi. Halabi died last May at the age of 69 at the hospital of the 'Magen-Nitzan' detention center.