Israel – More than 48 hours after he went on a rampage in central Tel Aviv, there was still no sign of the gunman who killed two and wounded several others in a shooting attack on Dizengoff Street Friday afternoon.
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Large numbers of undercover and uniformed police officers and agents from the Shin Bet Israel Security Agency continued to fan out across the Tel Aviv area on Sunday, focused largely on the northern areas of the city. The searches were especially heavy in Ramat Aviv, where the attacker’s cellphone was found on a sidewalk by a passerby not long after the attack, according to reports in the Israeli media on Sunday.
Later Sunday evening, Israeli police arrested three members of an Israeli-Arab family in Jaffa, on the suspicion of having contact with the perpetrator.
Rumors and false alarms were circulated to countless Israelis on social media throughout the day, especially on WhatsApp leading to a dramatic spike in calls to the police 100 emergency hotline.
Spokesperson of the Tel Aviv police, Chief Superintendent Hila Hamo said Sunday that police had seen a 1000% increase in the number of distress calls in the past 48 hours, most of them describing suspicious persons.
Police have called on the public not to hesitate to notify them if they spot someone they believe to be the suspected shooter, 31-year-old Nashat Milhem of Arara. The longer the hunt for Milhem continues, the more likely it is that he is receiving assistance, or is in a pre-arranged hiding place.
On Saturday, his brother Juedat Milhem was arrested on suspicion of being an accomplice to the attack. He was questioned by investigators without being able to speak to an attorney, a measure regularly taken in interrogations involving security crimes.
The avalanche of distress calls have sent large contingents of special police units scrambling to answer calls across the Tel Aviv area on Sunday, from Bat Yam in the south to Ramat Aviv in the city’s north.
Fear of the fugitive gunman led large numbers of parents to keep their children home from school on Sunday, especially in north Tel Aviv, not far from where Ayman Shaaban, a taxi driver from Lod was murdered on Friday in a killing police believe is linked to the attack.
Police said Sunday there are further details of the investigation that they are not publicizing for the time being in order to not thwart their efforts to find the killer. Their remains a gag order on the investigation of the shooting attack, and the same gag order secured on Friday also applies to the murder of Shaaban.
The public is advised to continue to be aware of their surroundings and to report suspicious activity, police said Sunday, adding that Milhem is considered armed and dangerous.
i i have one thing to say
” yemach shmoi veh’ zecroi
Someone is hiding him.