With 443 fatalities, 2025 is Israel’s deadliest year on the roads in two decades |
A spate of fatal car accidents at the start of this week made this year the deadliest for road users in two decades, with 443 people killed in traffic-related incidents since the start of 2025.
With just two weeks left until the end of the year, the number of road fatalities has already topped last year’s high death toll of 438 people, according to data from the National Road Safety Authority.
The past few years have seen increased numbers of traffic-related deaths, with road safety officials bemoaning persistent inaction by elected officials. The agency recorded 361 fatalities in 2023 and 351 in 2022.
This year’s death toll is the highest since 2005, when 460 were killed in traffic accidents.
Six people have been killed in traffic-related incidents this week, including a pedestrian in her 60s who was hit by a bus on Wednesday and later succumbed to her injuries in the hospital.
A young man from Beit Shemesh was killed Monday when he stopped his car on the side of highway following a tire puncture.
On Sunday, four people were killed, among them a three-year-old Bedouin girl who was hit by a car; Hatzalah paramedic Chemi Erlanger, who died in a crash while driving his motorcycle home; Gefen Cohen, an 18-year-old girl from Tiberias, who died after crashing in an off-road vehicle; and Raja Zoabi, a former athlete for the Bnei Sakhnin soccer team, who was killed in a motorcycle crash near Afula.
Of those killed this year, 118 were pedestrians, 142 were driving a private vehicle, 95 were on a motorcycle or motor scooter, 15 were on electric scooters or e-bikes,........