A doctor was shot dead inside a clinic in Kafr Yasif on Monday evening, Feb 3, hours after a teenage boy was killed in Lod — the fifth and sixth homicide victims within the Arab community in 24 hours. Dr. Abdallah Qasem Awad, a pediatrician from Mazra’a, Western Galilee, who had been filling in for another doctor at the time.
Paramedics who arrived shortly after the shooting declared Awad dead on the spot. Officers opened an investigation into the incident, but did not immediately arrest any suspects. “The unbearable violence and lawlessness have led to the deaths of six Israeli citizens in a single day,” said Israel Medical Association (IMA) Chairman Prof. Zion Hagay. “The state must wake up and put an end to this.” IMA declared a doctor’s strike all over Israel in protest the murder, who was held Tuesday morning. Hagay adds that the IMA demands that the government puts “an end to the negligence that has characterized this recent period” and “increases personal security in the Arab community.
Police at the scene of where a 14-year old boy was shot and killed in Lod, central Israel. February 3, 2025. Photo by Yossi Aloni/Flash90

Police at the scene of where a 14-year-old boy was shot and killed in Lod, central Israel. February 3, 2025 (Photo: Yossi Aloni / Flash90)
Earlier the same day, a teenage boy was fatally shot in Lod. The 14-year-old Lod resident, Muhammad Salman Abu Zaied, resident was critically injured alongside two others in Pardes Snir neighborhood. Hours earlier, three young men were gunned down near a kiosk in the northern town of Abu Snan. The victims are Wajdi Kheir, Haitem Zainati, and Natan Mashlab. Monday also saw a 46-year-old man stabbed to death in Abu Ghosh, Yaqub Jabr. He succumbed to his wounds at Shaarei Zedek Medical Center in Jerusalem.
Since the start of 2025, 29 Arab-Palestinian citizens in Israel have died in violent incidents, more than double the number of Arab homicide victims as of the same point last year. MK Youssef Atawneh (Hadash-Ta’al) said Monday evening that entire government bears responsibility for the endless bloodshed in Arab society. “This government provides a safety net for criminal organizations instead of stopping them, and fights anyone who dares to fight violence and crime. The government of bloodshed, with all its ministers, must stand before a state investigation committee and be tried for its failures in dealing with the criminal terrorism that is destroying the Arab society.”
The Abraham Initiatives organization, which tracks murder in Arab society, petitioned Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday to demand he appoint a permanent national security minister considering the years-long tide of violence rocking Arab society. “The appointment of Itamar Ben Gvir badly damaged the Arab public’s faith in the police and law enforcement, and the new minister who is appointed must restore that faith,” the letter read.
In an annual report, the Abraham Initiatives coexistence group estimated that last year, law enforcement solved just under 15% of murder cases in the Arab sector. Some 230 Arab Israelis were murdered in 2024, according to Abraham Initiatives data. This surpassed the previous year’s death toll in the sector due to crime, the highest since the state was founded, and over double the number of deaths compared to the previous year, at 224.In comparison, in 2022, 116 Arabs were killed in Israel, while in 2021, 126 were killed; in 2020, 96 were killed, and in 2019, 89 were killed.
MK Ahmed Tibi (Hadash-Ta’al) noted that police were up against underworld organizations that had grown tremendous power thanks to years of police neglect. “In practice, Arab society does not feel the presence of the police, they feel the presence of criminal organizations,” Tibi told The Times of Israel. “It’s as if these organizations are a state within a state — they set the pace, they murder time and time again, and the police can’t stop them.” “There is no punishment, there is no deterrence, so whoever murdered will do it again,” said Tibi.”
Furthermore, police and security forces shuttered on Tuesday, Jan 28, the offices of reconciliation committees in the Arab city of Umm al-Fahm. The “peace spreading” committees were an initiative of the High Follow-Up Committee for Arab Citizens of Israel, a leading umbrella organization among Arab-Palestinian national minority in Israel. Established by Sheikh Raed Salah in 2017, the committees operate with the stated goal of curbing violence in Arab society by mediating between feuding families. The raid came in the wake of a decision by far-right Defense Minister Israel Katz to outlaw the reconciliation program, citing its links to the Northern Branch of the Islamic Movement, which Salah heads.
Related: https://maki.org.il/en/?p=32426