Everyone knows their names, as if they were famous movie actors or high-level politicians. Some of them are guarded and secured no less than the prime minister and defense minister. Wherever they go, they are surrounded by numerous bodyguards on all sides to protect them and forestall any physical closeness to them. They travel throughout the country in luxurious vehicles with dark-tinted windows. It is not a secret that they are viewed as brutal, merciless people.

Even though they distance themselves from the limelight, almost every Israeli knows the identity of the heads of organized crime in Israel. We are familiar with them all in the same way: When they march into the halls of the courts of law and sit in the dock, they are always surrounded by a battery of well-known, expensive lawyers.

Ze'ev Rosenstein, Itzhak Abergil, Shalom Domrani and Amir Mulner are a few of the names that decorate the list of heads of crime organizations. Although most are serving long periods of incarceration in prison, their friends and certainly their “soldiers” in organized crime do not rest on their laurels. In contrast to the past, when they conducted their nefarious business far from the public eye, now their arena of activity has moved to the streets of the large cities. 

Two car explosions shook residential neighborhoods in the southern city of Ashkelon. The explosions were so powerful that buildings shook.