crime

Israeli soldiers inspect a Palestinian car in the West Bank city of Hebron, August 13, 2024. (Wisam Hashlamoun/Flash90)

Under Israel’s watch, Palestinian gangs are sowing chaos in the West Bank

By turning a blind eye to armed criminals while constraining Palestinian police, Israel is ‘engineering lawlessness’ to deepen its control over the territory.

By Sami Sawalmeh August 25, 2026

Police officers at the scene where a Palestinian man was killed in a car bomb in Lod, central Israel, February 15, 2023. (Jonathan Shaul/Flash90)

On TikTok, Palestinians in Israel are a scroll away from organized crime

Videos of luxury cars, cash, masked motorcyclists, and veiled threats have drawn over 100 million views, amplifying criminal power far beyond the street.

By Samah Watad April 7, 2026

Israeli forces stand guard as Palestinians pass through the Qalandia checkpoint on their way to attend the first Friday prayers of Ramadan at Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque, February 20, 2026. (Chaim Goldberg/Flash90)

Israel warns of a Ramadan escalation — while doing everything to provoke one

Eroding the status quo at Al-Aqsa, backing settler pogroms, ignoring violent crime: If there is an eruption, it will have been engineered by Israel alone.

By Baker Zoubi February 24, 2026

Latest

Palestinian and Jewish citizens of Israel attend a protest against rising violent crime in Palestinian society, in Tel Aviv, January 31, 2026. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

Why a Palestinian protest in Tel Aviv exposed the limits of Israeli solidarity

A mass demonstration against organized crime showed that Palestinian suffering can be acknowledged — so long as it is stripped of any political meaning.

By Samah Watad February 4, 2026

Palestinian citizens of Israel, including Hadash party head Ayman Odeh, hold a mass demonstration against the epidemic of criminal violence and state neglect, Sakhnin, northern Israel, January 22, 2026. (Michael Giladi/Flash90)

What the Joint List’s revival signifies for Palestinian politics in Israel

Beyond electoral arithmetic, the reunification of Arab parties is a step toward rebuilding political infrastructure and combating social fragmentation.

By Abed Abou Shhadeh January 28, 2026

Aida Touma-Suleiman podcast graphic

PODCAST: ‘Israel is using organized crime to control Palestinian citizens’

MK Aida Touma-Suleiman reflects on a decade inside the Knesset, and the limits of trying to fight from within a system built to exclude Palestinians.

By +972 Magazine January 22, 2026

Christmas celebrations in Nazareth, December 22, 2025. (Courtesy of the Orthodox Council of Nazareth)

In Nazareth, holiday festivities mask a ‘deep rot’

Facing rampant crime and corruption, a steep deficit, and a lack of municipal services, can the Palestinian ‘capital city’ inside Israel make a recovery?

By Baker Zoubi January 5, 2026

Israeli security forces at the scene of an explosion in Ramle, Sept. 12, 2024. (Avshalom Sassoni/Flash90)

Why Palestinians in Israel believe crime is a ‘strategic project of the state’

Amid an epidemic of gang violence, activists and experts see Israel's deliberate inaction as part of a campaign to dismantle Palestinian society from within.

By Baker Zoubi May 27, 2025

Police officers at the scene of a car bombing in Ramle, September 5, 2024. (Yossi Aloni/Flash90)

How weapons from the Gaza war are killing Palestinians on Israel’s streets

Arab crime organizations are carrying out attacks using smuggled military explosives, with experts accusing the government of turning a blind eye.

By Baker Zoubi October 1, 2024

Family and friends attend the funeral of five Palestinians who were shot to death in the Bedouin town of Basmat Tab’un, September 29, 2023. (Flash90)

Abandoned by the state, Palestinian citizens of Israel face record crime wave

Amid a proliferation of weapons and worsening police negligence since Oct. 7, violence by criminal organizations in Arab towns has reached historic levels.

By Baker Zoubi May 30, 2024

Israeli Minister of National Security Itamar Ben Gvir attends a cabinet meeting at the Prime Minister's Office in Jerusalem, July 30, 2023. (Marc Israel Sellem/POOL)

‘Sorry Mohammad’: What’s behind Ben Gvir’s apartheid honesty?

The national security minister’s brazen remarks are simply an expression of what this government was elected to do: rip the mask off Jewish supremacy.

By Edo Konrad August 25, 2023

Mourners at the funeral of 29-year-old Naeem Marjiyeh and 15-year-old Rami Marjiyeh in the the Catholic Church in the town of Yafa an-Nasariyye. The two were murdered, among three others, in a criminal shooting. June 9, 2023. (Oren Ziv)

‘Mama, are we going to die soon?’ Arab educators grapple with spiking violence

Lacking state support, three Palestinian citizens of Israel share what parents and schools can do to help children exposed to pervasive gun crime.

By Vera Sajrawi June 20, 2023

Members of the Palestinian community protest against the violence in their community, outside the Knesset, May 21, 2023. (Yonatan Sindel/Flash90)

Why Israeli police aren’t the solution to Palestinian crime

The fixation on policing has funneled us into a debate that avoids the real roots of the crisis of gun violence among Palestinian citizens of Israel.

By Amjad Iraqi June 18, 2023