My Israel Home

organized terror cells.

Coordinated attacks commonly generate what is known as a “high intelligence signature.” The attackers communicate beforehand, resulting in phone calls or emails that can be intercepted. Weapons must be purchased, and potential terrorists disappear from home or work at strange hours or stop attending school – all things that attract the attention of the thousands of Shin Bet informants.

In addition, the perpetrators were all former convicts who previously did time for terror-related offenses. Prior to embarking on their murderous spree in Hadera, Ayman and Ibrahim Ighbariah had changed their Facebook profile pictures to ISIS propaganda, while Al-Qian in Be’er Sheva and Diaa Hamarsheh from Bnei Brak had

Four were killed in Beer Sheva

both posted jihadist screeds on the day of the attack.

Why wasn’t the Shin Bet paying attention?

In an off-the-record briefing with Israel’s Haaretz newspaper, a senior police general related that the Shin Bet had inexplicably failed to build any intelligence infrastructure targeting ISIS in Israeli Arab and Palestinian society.

“We’re seeing a weakness at Shin Bet in terms of anything related to monitoring terrorist- or security-related activity against Israel,” he said.

“Over the last three years, Shin Bet security agency staff have not issued warnings on Islamic State activists being real threats, nor have they alerted the police to such operations on the ground,” the officer added. “Even when we were holding discussions to assess the situation, the representative from Shin Bet would be a junior official who didn’t add anything of substance.”

OperATiON WAve BreAker

The sudden spate of ISIS-inspired attacks has jolted Israel’s defense establishment into action. After the Bnei Brak attack, Prime Minister Naftali Bennett issued new directives enabling the Shin Bet to put Israeli Arabs in administrative detention, a holdover from the British Mandate allowing citizens to be imprisoned for six months without seeing a judge or a lawyer.

Realizing that armed civilians can be a force multiplier in stopping terror attacks, Bennett relaxed regulations in order to allow more people to be eligible for a personal carry permit.

“Open your eyes. Whoever has a license to carry a weapon, this is the time to carry it,” said the prime minister.

This past Wednesday, the Shin Bet raided central Israeli Arab towns known to be hotbeds of ISIS support, arresting over 80 terror suspects in Umm Al Fahum alone. On Saturday morning, commandos from the elite YAMAM SWAT team raided Jenin, shooting and killing three Islamic Jihad members on their way to commit coordinated terror attacks inside Israel. YAMAM operatives struck again a day later, taking down a Palestinian cell on the central Route 6 highway. Meanwhile, 1,200 IDF combat soldiers were deployed to major Israeli cities, where they will patrol and support police operations for the next month. This move is unprecedented, as Israel has traditionally refrained from handing police duties over to the military. While recruits in basic training had assisted law enforcement in 2015 during a wave of stabbing attacks in Jerusalem, never had armed soldiers been sent en masse to cities such as Tel Aviv, Ramat Gan, and Herzliya. All of the new measures are part of “Operation Wave Breaker,” a new coordinated campaign involving the IDF, Shin Bet, Israel Police, and Mossad to constrain the violence before it spirals out of control.

A riOTOuS rAmAdAN?

The aggressive response stems from several factors. Most pressing is Ramadan, which began on April 2 and will continue until early May. The Muslim holy month traditionally sees an upsurge in terrorist attacks in Israel and around the world, as the holiday brings with it increased religious fervor while hordes young men are out of school and work. To illustrate, a recent study by the Dutch think tank Datagraver found that terrorism in Israel jumped 200% during Ramadan between 2005 and 2016.

With hundreds of thousands of Palestinians and Israeli Arabs flocking to the Al Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount throughout Ramadan, the defense establishment fears that a scuffle between worshippers and police officers at the holy site could trigger widespread rioting that would rapidly spread to Judea and Samaria and Israeli Arab cities.

On everyone’s mind is the unprecedented Arab violence that tore Israel apart last Ramadan. Beginning with tensions over viral TikTok videos documenting Arab attacks on Jews, matters spiraled out of control when police faced off with rioters hurling bricks and firebombs at the Al Aqsa Mosque on Jerusalem Day.

Fueled by incitement on social media, the Hamas terror group launched rockets from Gaza “in order to protect Jerusalem from Zionist aggression,” leading Israel to launch the three week Operation Guardian of the Walls operation in response.

Escalations between Israel and Palestinian militant groups were nothing new. But for the first time in the country’s history, its Arab citizens joined in the violence out of homage to their Palestinian brothers.

For a week straight, tens of thousands of Israeli Arabs turned on their fellow citizens. In Lod and Ramle, only armed vigilante patrols prevented a massacre of the local Jewish community. In Akko, an inflamed Arab mob burned down Jewish hotels and businesses in the historic old city; hundreds of Bedouins blocked major thoroughfares in the south, pulled Jewish motorists out of their vehicles, and viciously beat them.

The unprecedented violence overwhelmed Israeli law enforcement and only an emergency call up of Border Police along with a curfew ended the week-long rioting. But the unrest left deep scars and shattered relations between Israel’s Jewish and Arab sectors.

“In little more than a week in May 2021, Arab rioters set ablaze 10 synagogues and 112 Jewish residences, looted 386 Jewish homes and damaged another 673, and set 849 Jewish cars on fire. There were also 5,018 recorded instances of Jews being stoned,” summarized a recent feature in Fathom Journal.

“Three Jews were murdered and more than 600 were hurt. Over 300 police officers were injured in disturbances in over 90 locations across the country,” continued the article. “The intensity and scope of the Arab uprising was unprecedented in recent decades, if not since the founding of Israel in 1948. For many Israeli Jews, the fact that masses of Arab Israeli citizens expressed open support for, and actively aided, Israel’s enemies during wartime shattered an illusion of growing coexistence between Jews and Arabs.”

In recent months, Israel’s defense establishment began preparing for the possibility that the aforementioned riots would repeat themselves. Shin Bet officers had summoned extremist imams and Arab principals for a “chat” and implored rabbis associated with Jewish Hilltop Youth in Judea and Samaria to calm tensions.

Now, the fact that Israeli Arabs are leading the wave of ISIS-inspired terrorism is raising fears that the May 2021 riots will repeat themselves. Israel’s aggressive response to the Arab terror wave is designed to prevent just that.

Indeed, Sunday evening saw clashes between Palestinian rioters and police at the Damascus Gate in Jerusalem’s Old City. At the same time, IDF Chief of Staff Aviv Kochavi warned that the military was preparing for a massive escalation that would result in “Operation Guardians of the Walls 2.0” and that the violence could lead ISIS to attack Jewish communities around the world.

It may be “deja vu all over again” – all the pieces are in place for the boiling cauldron to explode. The next few weeks will tell if Ramadan passes peacefully or if the entire country will be rocked by violence, Hashem

yishmor.