Tel Aviv braced for a backlash after mafia don killed by bomb

Published on Monday 17 November 2008 21:40

A CAR bomb explosion in central Tel Aviv killed one of Israel's top mafia kingpins yesterday, threatening to unleash an all-out war in Israel's increasingly violent underworld.

Israeli police identified the dead man as Yaakov Alperon – known informally as "Don Alperon" – the head of one of the country's most powerful crime families.

Israelis are accustomed to violence from their Palestinian neighbours but have traditionally felt relatively safe from violent crime. In recent years, however, mob wars have also plagued towns and cities.

"An extremely serious event took place today, and its consequences are completely clear to us," Tel Aviv police commander Ilan Franco said at the scene. "It likely happened because of an internal conflict within the Tel Aviv crime world … If there are consequences to this attack we will have to deal with them."

Alperon, Israel's most famous criminal, had also become something of a cultural icon. He and his brothers have given frequent TV interviews and his immediate family even took part in a reality TV show.

The brazen, midday assassination quickly dominated the news, pushing Palestinian rocket attacks from Gaza and a summit between the Israeli and Palestinian leaders off the airwaves.

Alperon's rental car went up in flames around noon in one of Tel Aviv's main streets. Police closed the road and TV footage showed his lifeless body slumped out of the door.

Alperon's many enemies included convicted drug lord Zeev Rosenstein and rival families that battled the Alperons over a lucrative bottle recycling racket.

Bottle recycling adds up to a $5 million-a-year industry. Police say criminals sell restaurants protection in exchange for empties, which leave no paper trail and offer crime families a relatively legitimate source of income.