A court in the United Arab Emirates sentenced three people to death on Monday for the murder of Israeli-Moldovan rabbi Zvi Kogan, who was killed in November, state news agency WAM reported.
The Abu Dhabi Federal Appeal Court ruled that Kogan’s killing was carried out for a “terrorist purpose.” A fourth defendant received a life sentence in connection with the crime. Death penalty rulings in the UAE can be appealed.
Kogan, 28, was a representative of Chabad, an Orthodox Jewish outreach group, and had lived in the UAE for several years. His body was discovered in Al Ain days after he was reported missing. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office condemned the killing as an “antisemitic terrorist act.”
The UAE’s interior ministry said three of those arrested were citizens of Uzbekistan. Such crimes are rare in the UAE, widely considered one of the region’s safest countries.
The Jewish presence in the UAE has grown since the 2020 Abraham Accords, which normalized ties between Israel and the Gulf nation. However, amid the ongoing Israel-Hamas war, security concerns have led to reduced visibility of the Jewish community, with informal synagogues in Dubai closing after the October 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack on Israel.