Home and Garden Mission. This is how Israel has ended up naming an operation that, when it began on Monday morning, with the air and ground attack on the Jenin refugee camp, it did not even want to name; but which, due to its violent forms, already carried the title of a large-scale military operation, not seen in the West Bank since the end of the second intifada.
In fact, it had been almost 20 years, since 2005, that the Israeli army had not deployed more than a thousand soldiers in the area or bombed with drones, let alone in the north, stronghold of several Palestinian militias, let alone for two days. The Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has declared that he will continue as long as necessary, “until the objectives are achieved”.
At least eight Palestinians had died yesterday (five of them militants) and more than 50 had been injured (ten seriously) by press time, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health, which said the numbers could be higher. , because the Israeli troops made it difficult for ambulances to access. “What is happening is a real war,” said Khaled Alahmad to the Reuters agency after more than a dozen airstrikes and battles between soldiers and militiamen. “Every time we enter between five and seven ambulances, we return full of wounded”, added the medical driver.
Despite the fact that in the last two weeks there was much speculation about a major campaign (settler leaders demanded it, also far-right members of the Government), the flight of drones and the noise of explosions is already a real horror for the 14,000 Palestinian refugees who they live in the camp of less than half a square kilometer, which has led UN representatives to demand that the protection of civilians be guaranteed.
The Israeli army claims that it has arrested about 20 suspects, that it has managed to destroy several installations, including the operations center of the Jenin Brigade (one of the armed groups that has emerged in the area and that gathers militia of all factions), and that it has confiscated weapons and explosives, some inside the Al-Ansar mosque. Images on the networks and local reports also showed how the passage of Israeli bulldozers has caused the breaking of streets, while the municipality of Jenin indicated that this cut off the supply of water and electricity.
According to the words of the international spokesman of the Israeli army, Richard Hecht, in this way, the operation aims to “break with the dynamics of the terrorists” of attacking Israeli targets and returning to the field. Despite this, several Israeli officials have emphasized that the campaign does not aim against the Palestinian Authority or to occupy the countryside, but to “focus on Jenin” without extending to other parts of the West Bank, occupied by Israel since 1967.
However, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant has made it clear that Israeli forces “are prepared for any possibility” if there are rocket launches from Gaza, the West Bank or border countries.
The Palestinian militias have not given clear indications of what the reprisals would be, beyond warning of a “wide escalation”. The political leader of the Islamist group Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, has pointed out that “the blood shed in Jenin will determine the nature of the next phase”. And the head of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Riad Najleh, has promised a response “to end the slaughter”. In the middle, the spokesman for the Palestinian Authority, Nabil Abu Rudeinah, came to describe the operation as a “war crime” and “brutal aggression”, a condemnation to which Jordan, Egypt and the Arab League have added.
On the other hand, those called to demonstrate multiplied in different areas of the West Bank during the day and, in one of the mobilizations in the city of Al-Bireh, adjacent to Ramallah, a 21-year-old young man die from a gunshot to the head.
Whatever the end of this campaign in Jenín, it will not be the last. “We will finish this operation and come back in a few days or a few weeks,” warned Yehuda Fox, Israeli military chief in the West Bank.
