Israeli Man Indicted for Murdering Wife at Tel Aviv Hotel

A man who killed his wife in a Tel Aviv Hotel a month ago was indicted in the city’s District Court on Wednesday.

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Yosef and Dalia Baruch, 65 and 63 years old, respectively, came to visit Israel on May 5. One month later, they rented a room in Tel Aviv’s Renaissance Hotel, where the murder took place.

The couple had moved to Istanbul in 2001 and frequently visited their relatives in Israel. But on June 12, the night before the murder, Dalia Baruch said she would not be returning to Turkey with her husband. According to the charges, the two had an argument, and Dalia said she intended to stay in Israel and rent an apartment in the port city of Ashdod.

Yosef Baruch told the police that in the heat of the argument, and to silence his wife’s shouting, he took a pillow from the bed and suffocated her. Then, in an apparent attempt to take his own life, he swallowed a large number of pills and cut himself with a utility knife.

When the hotel staff saw water seeping out of the couple’s room the next morning, they entered the room to find the body of Dalia Baruch on the floor. Her husband was lying in the bathtub with numerous cuts on his body.

A Magen David Adom rescue team evacuated Yosef Baruch to the Tel Aviv Medical Center in serious condition. He was discharged from the hospital and taken into custody four days later.

A letter the police found in the hotel room said: “I write this letter with great sorrow and am forced to do this sadly and am ending our lives.”

The Forensic Institute issued a statement saying that Dalia Baruch’s death was caused by asphyxiation.