Police revealed this week that a Jewish resident of Shvut Rachel had confessed to a series of violent crimes, committed from 1997 to 2009, including the murder of two Arab men and bomb attacks on a left-wing professor and a family of Christian missionaries. On Monday, they revealed that the suspect, Yaakov Teitel, had also confessed to two other murders – a confession that investigators say was clearly false.
Teitel confessed to murdering two young Jews in a Tel Aviv club for homosexual youth, investigators said. However, police said Teitel was clearly not responsible for the murders, and that the real killer apparently remains at large.
Shin Bet investigators determined that the confession was false due to the fact that Teitel's description of the Tel Aviv shooting in his confession did not match up with the true series of events. In addition, none of the weapons in his possession matched the murder weapon, and eyewitnesses testified that he was not in Tel Aviv at the time of the killing.
Shmaya Tiram, spokesman for Teitel's hometown of Shvut Rachel, said the false confession raised questions regarding other attacks which Teitel has apparently confessed to. Just as one allegation was proved false, "others may be proven false as well,” he said.
Tiram had questions regarding the weapons cache which Teitel allegedly hid in his backyard as well. The cache pictured in various media reports is too large to have fit into the small hole in Teitel's yard in which the weapons were allegedly stashed, he told Arutz-7. The weapons would not fit even if they were dismantled, he added.