"They chose him so the country would tremble": The dark secret behind the assassination of the first judge in Israel

On the evening of July 19, 2004, Judge Adi Azar (of blessed memory) finished his workday and returned to his home in Ramat HaSharon. He parked his car near the house but did not get out immediately. Azar remained in the vehicle and spoke on the phone. Minutes later, the assassin arrived, approached the car, and shot him three times.

No one in the house heard the shooting. The one who discovered the horror was Azar's son, then seven years old, who went out of the house to walk the dog. The child noticed his father's car, approached it when he did not understand why he was not getting out — and then saw the blood. He returned to the house and alerted the family members.

Thus began one of the most unusual and shocking murder cases in the country's history: for the first time in Israel, a sitting judge was murdered. Within a short time, the street was filled with police officers, Magen David Adom personnel, crime scene investigators — and also judges and senior officials in the judicial system who arrived at the scene, struggling to digest what had happened. Retired Police Brigadier General Avi Neuman, who was then head of the investigation department at the Tel Aviv Central Unit and was among the leaders of the investigation, remembers most of all the look in their eyes.

"What I remember most is the shock," he says. "Suddenly you see the entire top of the court, all the judges I know from the courts, all of them next to me at the scene. And what I remember most — without understatement — are the terrified eyes. This is the first time a sitting judge has been murdered in the State of Israel. Everyone felt: maybe he is next in line? What is happening here? They murdered a judge."

More than two decades later, the motive for the murder still sounds almost inconceivable: Azar was not murdered because of a case he managed, a verdict he gave, or a personal dispute. He was chosen almost at random. Two life-term prisoners wanted to shock the country by murdering a senior figure from the law enforcement system — and then use the murder itself to try and release one of them from prison.

Hundreds of files, countless directions

When the police arrived at the scene, Azar had already been evacuated in an attempt to save his life. Resuscitation efforts were unsuccessful. The mobile laboratory was called to the scene, the vehicle was closed for inspection, and Tel Aviv Central Unit investigators began collecting testimonies from family members and neighbors. Already in the first hours, there was a detail at the scene that bothered the investigators: no one in the house, who was very close to the car, heard the shots.

According to Neuman, the number of casings found at the scene and the fact that the window in the house was open but no one heard anything led the investigators quickly to the conclusion that the shooter used a pistol with a silencer. "The moment we saw it was a pistol with a silencer, we knew we were in trouble," he recalls. "This is not something random. Someone planned this and did preparation. In movies, you see in every murder a pistol with a silencer, but in reality, it is a very rare thing."

The investigation set out in almost every possible direction. The investigators checked the scene, looked for security cameras — a much more complex task in 2004, long before the era when almost every street and house is filmed — and questioned neighbors in the hope that someone noticed a figure or an unusual vehicle. At the same time, another huge task began: to check the judge's work.

Azar dealt with the civil field and handled over the years dozens and even hundreds of cases, some of them in disputes that touched on large sums of money. From the investigators' point of view, in each of them could hide a person who thought the judge harmed him. "You start asking who is the judge, what did he handle," says Neuman. "We discover quite quickly dozens of cases, if not hundreds. Truly endless cases, and in each of them could hide the motive."

The court itself became an investigation scene. Colleagues, employees, and people who knew Azar were asked if they knew of a threat, harassment, or a person who was looking for him. Directions in his private life were also checked, but after weeks of investigation, it turned out that the key to solving it was in a completely different place.

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The pressure reached the top of the country

Already on the first night, it was clear to the investigators that this was a case different from any other murder case. Neuman recalls that at some point, while returning to his car, he heard on the radio the then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon (of blessed memory) referring to the murder and saying that "something terrible has happened today in Israel" and that the police would act to reach the perpetrators. "I hear the Prime Minister talking about it," he says, "and I say to myself — I am here with some ten investigators, and what is this now 'the whole police'?"

Also in the police top, they debated who would lead the investigation. Neuman recalls how he stood next to the head of the investigation division Moshe Mizrahi and Tel Aviv District Commander Yossi Sedbon, while the two discussed whether to transfer the case to another unit or leave it in the hands of the Tel Aviv Central Unit. Mizrahi, according to him, estimated that the police would crack the case within 48 hours. The reality was different. The covert investigation lasted about three months.

The note that changed the picture

About a day after the murder, a detail was discovered in Azar's car that later became one of the central pieces of the puzzle: a note with a call for the release of Yitzhak Zuziashvili, a life-term prisoner convicted of another murder. At first, it was difficult to understand the meaning of the note. Why would someone who murdered a judge leave at the scene specifically a demand for the release of a person who is already behind bars?

The answer later turned out to be a plot that seemed almost imaginary. Zuziashvili and Rafi Nachmani met in prison. Both were convicted criminals serving heavy prison sentences. Through associates, Zuziashvili helped arrange for Nachmani to go on leave — a leave from which he did not return. Nachmani became an escaped prisoner.

According to the infrastructure that was eventually accepted in court, the two concocted a plan: to commit a crime that would be so severe that the entire country would want to solve it at any cost. Zuziashvili, who would remain in prison and thus supposedly be disconnected from the execution, would then offer the police critical information for solving the murder — and in return would demand a dramatic relief in his sentence.

The means that was intended to be that "bargaining chip" was the pistol with which the murder would be committed. "The motive is inconceivable," says Neuman. "They murdered a judge so that he could say where the pistol used for the murder is, and try to receive in return a release from prison."

Who will be the victim?

Adi Azar himself was also not the target from the beginning. According to Neuman, for days the involved debated which person from the law enforcement system would become the victim. The options examined included a police officer, a prison service officer, or a judge. The goal was to choose a target whose harm would create an unprecedented public shock. Finally, they decided on a judge.

Names and addresses were collected, and checks and surveillance were conducted. Azar was chosen because he lived in a private house and because it was relatively easy to follow his daily routine — from the court to his home and back. "If you ask if he was chosen randomly — the answer is yes," says Neuman. "They chose him to cause a shock, and also because it was convenient to follow him."

Also in the verdict, it was emphasized that there was no prior connection between the judge and his murderers. Azar simply "happened to be in their way," as was written in the verdict.

And then came the demand: release in exchange for information

After Nachmani left prison and did not return, the plan began to roll outside the walls. He teamed up with an associate of Zuziashvili, who later became a state witness. The man served as Nachmani's driver in what was presented to him, according to his claim, as "tours for debt collection." In practice, according to the indictment, the tours were intended for gathering information about possible targets — and at their center were judges.

According to Neuman, Nachmani spent several weeks gathering information and assembling a team that would assist him. The state witness was the driver. According to the state witness's version, he did not know from the beginning that the goal was murder. In the investigation, he claimed that he thought the plan was to harm a person in a way that is not lethal, but in a way that would cause a media shock.

Eventually, Azar was chosen. On the day of the murder, the state witness drove Nachmani to the area of the judge's house. Nachmani waited for him, shot him to death, and threw into the car the note that called to release Zuziashvili. After that, the two drove to a beach in Michmoret. There, according to the investigation findings, Nachmani burned his clothes and hid the pistol in the sand.

The next part of the plan began only after the murder. About a week later, Zuziashvili's representatives approached the Attorney General and announced that their client was ready to assist in locating the pistol used for the murder and to provide information that could shed light on the identity of the perpetrators — on the condition that he would have a retrial at the end of which he would be released from prison.

About a month later, after the demand was not met, another approach was made to the State Attorney. This time was attached, according to the case materials, an urgent message that demanded to meet the conditions within 48 hours, otherwise, there is expected "danger that means harm to life." Thus, the plan was gradually revealed: to create a shocking national murder, to leave behind evidence that the state would be desperate to obtain — and then to offer it in exchange for freedom.

The smoking gun

The way from the murder scene to Zuziashvili and Nachmani was not immediate. According to Neuman, the covert investigation lasted about three months. During it, the investigators began to identify the figures who surrounded the two and connect them to the event. After the investigation became overt, arrests were made, and about three weeks after them, one of the involved became a state witness.

His testimony became a central part of the case — but also a significant legal problem. The District Court in Jerusalem determined that despite difficulties and contradictions in the state witness's testimony, it reliably describes the events and is consistent with a series of other data and evidence. However, due to the witness's status and due to the difficulties that fell in his testimony, significant evidentiary support was required.

This support was found. One of the central components was the pistol used for the murder. According to Neuman, the police reached it during the investigation through another witness, and not through the state witness. It was a stolen pistol. Finding the weapon, combined with the testimonies and other evidence collected, closed a significant part of the evidentiary circle.

"A cinematic horror script — but this time in reality"

Zuziashvili and Nachmani were put on trial and convicted of the judge's murder and other offenses. Both were sentenced to life imprisonment, alongside additional prison terms for the accompanying offenses. In the verdict, the judges described the affair in particularly sharp words: "A factual tapestry was proven before us that would not shame a cinematic horror script, but this time, and to our sorrow — in reality."

It was also written that the two "extended their murderous hand toward a senior judge," whom they chose at random and liquidated "with chilling cold-bloodedness." Zuziashvili was described in the verdict as the "architect of the affair from its beginning." The two appealed to the Supreme Court, but their appeal was rejected. The Supreme Court judges recognized that the state witness's testimony required exceptional caution, but determined that the District Court did indeed examine it cautiously and that it was supported by significant supporting evidence. In the verdict, it was written that the two murdered Azar "only because they found that he was a convenient victim whose killing was required for the realization of their twisted plan."

The murder shocked not only the police but the entire judicial system. In his eulogy for Azar, the then-President of the Supreme Court, Aharon Barak, said: "Murdering a person because he is a judge is a bullet in the soul of democracy." Barak clarified that murdering a judge would not deter the judicial system: "No threat — whatever its source may be — will divert us from our path as judges."

Even after more than 20 years, Neuman returns precisely to the absurdity at the base of the affair. Azar did not know those who decided on his death, did not manage a procedure against them, and did nothing that made him their enemy. He was murdered because he was a judge, because he lived in a place where it was possible to follow him — and mainly because two criminals believed that his murder would cause the country to "tremble." The affair also left a mark on the conduct regarding life-term prisoners. According to Neuman, following the case, the practice that allowed at that period the exit of life-term prisoners for leaves was stopped.

Most of all, the image from the first evening in Ramat HaSharon remained: a car near a house, a judge who was shot without his family members hearing anything, a seven-year-old child who goes out to walk the dog — and an entire system that understands for the first time that a judge in Israel was murdered because of his very being a judge. The reason for this, as it turned out only months later, was almost harder to digest than the murder itself.