JERUSALEM/DUBAI (Reuters) – An Israeli rabbi reported missing in the United Arab Emirates has been found murdered, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said on Sunday, denouncing his death as a “hateful anti-Semitic terrorist act.”
Zvi Kogan, who worked in the Emirates for the Orthodox Jewish group Chabad, which assists several thousand Jewish tourists and residents in this Gulf country, had been missing in Dubai since Thursday.
“The State of Israel will use all means at its disposal to bring to justice the criminals responsible for his death,” the prime minister’s office said in a statement.
Zvi Kogan's body was found in the Emirati town of Al Ain, near Oman, but it is not yet clear whether he was killed there or elsewhere, the former man told Reuters Israeli Druze politician Ayoob Kara.
He added that he was waiting for the end of the investigation led by the United Arab Emirates, while pointing the finger at Iran's responsibility.
Iran's Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to Reuters' requests for comment. Emirati and Israeli authorities have not said who was involved in the killing, or what the motives might be.
(Crispian Balmer, Menna Alaa El Din, Andrew Mills, Alexander Cornwell and Parisa Hafezi, Gilles Guillaume for the French version)
