Three murderers of Chabad rabbi sentenced to death in UAE – report

In November, Rabbi Zvi Kogan, who worked for the Chabad emissary of the UAE, was murdered by three Uzbek citizens after a botched kidnapping attempt.

By Vered Weiss, World Israel News

Three Uzbek citizens, arrested for murdering a Chabad Rabbi in Dubai, were reportedly sentenced to death.

The United Arab Emirates’s Ministry of the Interior identified the suspects as Olembay Toyirovich, 28, Mahmoud Abd Rahim, 28, and Azizet Kamalovich, 33.

The UAE had released a photograph of the three in custody.

A conversation between one of the murderers telling his mother about the sentence was published on social media.

Rabbi Zvi Kogan, a dual Israeli-Moldovan citizen, served as an aide to the UAE chief rabbi and owned a kosher grocery in Abu Dhabi. On the morning of November 21, he was abducted and driven by his kidnappers in his own car towards the Oman border.

Days later, his body was discovered in the car, showing clear signs of murder.

Shortly after, relatives and friends described Kogan’s death as “a bloody end,” though they did not provide further details.

A report revealed that the three suspects involved in the killing had originally planned to smuggle the 28-year-old rabbi across the border to Oman alive. It is still unclear what stopped the three Uzbek nationals from crossing the border with Kogan, ultimately leading to his murder.

UAE security forces arrested the three suspects a few days after Kogan was reported missing.

Shortly after the murder, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, “I sent heartfelt condolences to the Kogan family. The State of Israel will use all means and will deal with these murderers, and those who dispatched them, to the fullest extent of the law. None of them will get away.”