Terror surge linked to High Holy Days
ISRAELI SECURITY forces in the West Bank and East Jerusalem have borne the brunt of a fresh wave of terror attacks in recent days.
The spike in violence was foreseen by Israeli intelligence officers, who believe it is connected to the Muslim and Jewish High Holy Days.
In the five days between last Friday and Tuesday there were nine stabbing attacks, mainly in the Hebron area and East Jerusalem. Five Israeli security personnel were injured. Six Palestinian assailants were killed and another three wounded.
This rate of violence is similar to the last three months of 2015, when the previous wave of violence was at its peak. The violence began to subsidise early in the year as the motivation to attack on the Palestinian side decreased and both Israeli and Palestinian security services adapted their methods to deal with the situation.
Last weekend, the IDF reinforced its West Bank units with additional battalions, and the police doubled their presence in East Jerusalem.
According to a senior IDF officer, the deployments had been planned before the latest terror wave struck due to an expectation of increased violence following the Muslim Eid al-adha festival and before the Jewish High Holy Days.
The officer said all the attackers were acting as “lone wolves” and not on the directions of terror organisations, though some had been influenced by incitement online. At least in some of the cases, the assailants had been acting onpersonalmotivesandmayhavebeen attempting to commit suicide in order to attain the status of a (martyr).
On Wednesday, a 13-year-old Palestiniangirladvancedthreateninglytowards an Israeli checkpoint and, after refusing to stop, was shot by guards in her foot. Afterwards, she told police that she had intendedtocommitsuicideandtriedto look like an attacker, although she was not carrying any weapon.
PA President Mahmoud Abbas on Tuesday sent a condolence letter to the family of a Jordanian shot dead while attempting to stab Israeli police officers in Jerusalem on Friday. In the letter, Mr Abbas called the attacker a “martyr”.
The Gaza border remained relatively calm this week. On Tuesday, the IAF detected a Hamas drone taking off in Gaza. It was intercepted and shot down .