Israeli Defense Forces Seek to Seize Palestinian Terrorists in Counterterrorism Operation
This week, Israel’s incursion into Jenin, a Palestinian city in West Bank/Judea and Samaria, resulted in the deaths of 6 Palestinian terrorists – three of them linked to Palestinian Islamic Jihad – when clashes broke out between armed men and Israeli troops on Monday morning (19). To evacuate eight wounded soldiers from the battle zone, it was the first time since the Second Intifada that an Israeli helicopter opened fire, according to Israel Army Radio. In a joint statement, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and the Border Police said that the Israelis entered the northern West Bank city in the early morning hours to detain two wanted Palestinians.
In response to the raid, on Tuesday (20), armed Palestinian men carried out a terrorist attack against civilians who were at a gas station and a restaurant in Eli, a Jewish town in the West Bank/Judea and Samaria region. They then attacked the customers of the adjacent restaurant, Hummus Eliyahu. Four people were killed and four others were wounded. At least two terrorists responsible for the attack have been neutralized so far.
Tuesday’s attack was celebrated in the Palestinian city of Nablus with the distribution of candy, with a message that translates as “Bullet for Operation ‘Eli’. Blood for blood.”
André Lajst, a political scientist specialized in the Middle East and executive president of StandWithUs Brazil, explains that “Israel’s incursions into the West Bank have been taking place since February of last year as part of ‘Breaking the Wave’, a joint operation by Israeli security forces that aims to contain the waves of violence and terrorist attacks in Israel, seeking to apprehend terrorists living mainly in Jenin and Nablus.
Counterterrorism Operation
Tensions between Israel and the Palestinians have increased since March 2022, following a series of terrorist attacks in Be’er Sheva, Bnei Brak and Hadera, which at the time left 11 dead and 12 wounded. Since then, the IDF has launched Operation Breaking the Wave, a counterterrorism action, to contain the series of terror attacks carried out by Palestinians, to arrest the perpetrators, and to prevent future attacks.
Since the start of Operation Breaking the Wave on March 31, 2022, Palestinian attacks (25 in total), in Israel and the West Bank/Judea and Samaria have killed 45 people and left several others seriously wounded, including the victims of Tuesday’s (20) attack.
“It is incalculable the number of victims that could have been made had counterterrorism actions not been planned and executed by the IDF,” Lajst comments. “By the recent escalation of violence, Israel is preparing an ever stronger operation to try to stem this wave of terrorism, even using a helicopter for the first time in many years.”