At the request of Israel, Morocco extradited on Wednesday an Israeli national who is wanted by Israeli police for his role in a bomb attack that killed three in Tel Aviv in 2003, tweeted the Israeli news outlet Ynet.
Police detained Golan Avitan, the wanted fugitive, shortly after he landed at Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv on Wednesday morning.
Avitan, who had been living in Morocco for four years, fled Israel in 2018 while under house arrest for his involvement in the almost decade-old Tel Aviv bomb attack.
He was also a main suspect in Case 512, an organized criminal inquiry that Israeli security services launched in May 2015. The inquiry led to the arrest of about 50 members of organized crime gangs in Israel for their links to cases of money laundering, conspiracy, drug trafficking, and murder.
Case 512 has been labeled “one of the largest underworld busts in Israel’s history,” according to the Times of Israel.
Israeli police arrested Avitan for supplying the remote controls that set off the explosives used in the 2003 attack in a Tel Aviv building.
Zev Rozenstein, a rival of the Abergil crime family, was the main target of the bombing. The incident left 20 people injured and claimed the lives of three.
Avitan was charged with murder for his involvement in the plot, but he was eventually placed under house arrest after his lawyer managed to reduce his sentence.
Read also: Morocco, Israel Sign Legal Deal to Strengthen Cooperation
According to reports, Avitan used the excuse of a dentist appointment to escape in 2018. He boarded a yacht to Cyprus, Spain, and finally Morocco.
In October 2020, police representatives from Israel and Morocco agreed to organize the extradition of Golan Avitan and Chiko (Moshe) Beit Adah, another Israeli fugitive, Israeli media reported.
The two countries signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on legal cooperation on July 27, 2022, in a bid to strengthen their cooperation in the fight against crime and terrorism. The agreement is also expected to improve police coordination between the two nations.
