Police expose vehicle-smuggling pipeline used in northern gang killings

After a covert and complex investigation by the Northern District’s Major Crimes Unit, prosecutors in Nazareth North filed a serious indictment on Thursday against a 22-year-old woman from Jisr az-Zarqa. Police say she was a key logistical link for northern crime groups, bringing stolen and cloned cars into Israel from the West Bank and Judea and Samaria. The vehicles, fitted with cloned license plates, were intended as operational cars for assassination crews carrying out criminal shootings and targeted killings.

Investigators say the suspect followed a systematic routine. She allegedly traveled to the area, took possession of stolen cars bearing the plate numbers of innocent citizens, crossed them into Israel, and delivered them to meeting points at Hutzot Alonim near Yokneam. There, she parked the cars, left the keys inside, and left by taxi. Police also said she carried out all of this while under two active court driving bans.

The investigation found a direct connection between her smuggling and serious violent crimes in the north. In early April, she allegedly brought in a Nissan with cloned plates, and days later that car was used by an assassination squad in Nazareth to kill a local resident. At the end of March, she allegedly smuggled a stolen and cloned Kia through the HaBik’a crossing and brought it to Daliyat al-Karmel. Weeks later, that vehicle was used in a gang conflict in Shefa-‘Amr, where a local man was shot and badly wounded.

The indictment, filed at the court in Nazareth, includes nine charges, among them conspiracy to commit a felony, falsifying vehicle identification marks, and driving while disqualified. Police said the case was built through a long covert probe involving intelligence gathering, surveillance, and review of security-camera footage, and that they will continue pursuing anyone who helps organized crime obtain tools for serious offenses.