3-Feb-13: Another hostage-seeking terror group busted by alert Israeli security

Israeli hitch-hiking post [Image Source]

We reported here earlier today ["3-Feb-13: Little noticed, unjustly-released terrorists are in charge of the ongoing jihad attacks against Israelis"] about the successful intercept and arrest of a Hamas gang based in Hebron whose members were taken out of the game before their plans for shootings and kidnappings of Israelis could be put into effect. We also noted the central role played by one of the 1,027 unjustly-released murderers who walked free as part of the ill-conceived Shalit Transaction.

Some hours ago today (Sunday), we learned of the arrest of a second gang with similar intentions. Like the Hebron arrestees, these terrorists were tracked down by a combination of security agencies, in this case the Shabak and the Border Police. The Hebron gang were controlled by Hamas. Today's losers owed allegiance to Islamic Jihad.

They are 

• Sayeed Manjhid Div Jasor and Tawfek Hadar Joufek Ajbonariyeh, residents of the Palestinian Arab town of Jenin, aged 19 and 18. 
• Two Israeli citizens: Yousef Hassin Youssef Warda, 34, from Qalansawe in central Israel; Anas Jabiran, 18, from the central Israeli Arab town of Umm al-Fahm

The two Arab citizens of Israel were indicted today at the Lod Regional Court. Their indictment was the first public indication of the plot. Times of Israel's report quotes a press announcement from the Shabak saying 

"The affair illustrates once again the terrorist organizations' intentions to abduct Israelis to use as a betting chip in prisoner release negotiations, with the active involvement of terrorists already in Israeli prisons...  Terrorist organizations are continuing to try and use Arab-Israelis to further their cause, taking advantage of the freedom of movement the Israeli ID allows them as well as Arab-Israelis ability to smuggle Judea and Samaria residents in their car..."

Ynet's report says the arrested cell members got their instructions from two Islamic Jihad terrorist operatives, one of whom is currently a prisoner in an Israeli jail. The other remote-controller, aware that the Israeli authorities would now come looking for him, turned himself in to the Palestinian Authority police.

The details of the plot sound like a comedy of errors in the re-telling, but have a deadly serious core to them.

The jihadists spent two full days trying to kidnap either an IDF soldier or a citizen from central Israel hitchhiking posts, but failed to entice anyone suitable into their car. They then changed gears and focused on trying to kidnap New Year’s Eve revelers wending their way home after partying but failed in that too. They then decided to spend the night in their vehicle, parking it close to the IDF checkpoint at the Eyal junction, near the Tel Aviv suburb of Kfar Saba, with the intention of trying once more after daybreak. But for reasons we can only guess at, they attracted suspicion during the night and security forces pounced on their vehicle, finding rope, masking tape, knitted caps, ski masks, box-cutters, and a mock gun. The suspects were then taken into custody. Subsequently, eight more Islamic Jihad terrorists from Jenin were apprehended and are now under arrest in Israel as a result of the interrogations of the first four. 

The serious core is that this is yet another instance of co-ordinated efforts, managed by remote control, to replicate the achievement of the Shalit Transaction  The terrorists, including Arabs who hold Israeli citizenship papers, learned something empowering in their successful brinkmanship with the government of Israel leading up to the release of the 1,027: if you can capture Jewish hostages, you are on the way to undermining the morale and the determination of the Israeli public, an effect that can be accelerated via the media and the social activist circles and - ultimately - via the political leadership and the people on whom it relies for advice.

They see that the return on investment can be substantial, worth the patience and effort that it calls for. The irony is that what they learned happens to come from the man who wrote the book on how to repulse them. Refer to page 144 of "Fighting Terrorism: How Democracies Can Defeat Domestic and International Terrorists", a 1997 best-seller by Binyamin Netanyahu, about which we blogged in October 2011: see "12-Oct-11: "We may come to bitterly regret this transaction for years to come".

19-Jul-06: The fog of war

Having viewed other people's wars through the lens of the television screen over the years, and lived through several in a more direct fashion, we know how different the reality is from the image. To give our readers a small taste of the sort of chaos and uncertainty that comes with the up-close experience, here's a snapshot of what's happening at 10.30 Wednesday morning - a thin time-slice in an event-rich and turbulent period.

• First, most of the country is without electricity at this moment. Jerusalem where we live was blacked out for about 15 minutes around 9.30 this morning, but power was restored and has stayed "up" for now. But we're told to expect rolling blackouts around the country for an unspecified amount of time to come. Elevators are shut down and stuck in many places with hundreds of people stuck inside them. The firefighters and police are scattering to respond to rescue calls (as if they did not have enough to do already).
• Since traffic lights need power, there's traffic chaos in much of Israel.
• There are tens of fires - mostly brushfires as far as we know - in various parts of the north. No immediate explanation. Maybe the heat, maybe missiles, maybe arson.
• The entire Sharon region (basically the northern arc around Tel-Aviv) is subject to an immediate and concrete highest-level terror warning. There may be a pursuit underway right now of a specific individual or terror gang. One report (basing itself as always on news tips from its readers) says there's a suspicion of terrorists having penetrated Tel-Aviv. (UPDATE: At 11am, the authorities in Kfar Sava, a tel-Aviv suburb, are urging people to stay indoors while the pursuit is underway.) As always, reports like this need to be taken with enormous care, but in this part of the world, you can never tell, never be too wary.
• After absorbing about 120 Katyusha missiles yesterday, the north is on edge again and under attack today. In Nahariya (where a man running towards cover in a shelter after the sirens sounded, was killed) and Haifa, there are reports this past ten minutes of multiple Katyusha attacks, multiple booms and at least one direct hit in Haifa (on a residential building). This happened around 10am. Residential buildings in this country are almost invariably apartment houses with six or eight residences or more. For security reasons - a reluctance to convey to the enemy how accurate or inaccurate their fire is - the radio and television are being cloudy about what and where, but there are injuries.
• Some twenty Qassam rocket attacks pounded the area around Gaza during the night and early morning. The IDF is now moving into the central Gaza strip, with few clear details other than that five soldiers are wounded. It's a developing story, it appears.
• Today and yesterday - significant fighting right inside Nablus. Given the circumstances, the over-stretched state of military management resources and all that's going on elsewhere, it's our guess this was initiated by the locals and not by the IDF. There's little concrete information to go on for the moment.
• The army, under Israeli public pressure to convey both the scale of the achievements and the size of the ongoing problem, is quoted in this morning's news saying that its forces have destroyed 180 Katyusha rocket sites in Lebanon and some 200 Hizbullah buildings and weapons warehouses. In the nature of things, it's hard to put this into a context, but the military's estimate is this represents between 40% and 50% of what Hizbollah have in place. But the essence of their message is this: Hizbollah have had six years (since the total withdrawal of any Israeli presence from Southern Lebanon) to dig in, spread out and equip themselves. Six years of passive-aggressive apathy and non-interference by the government in Beirut. Six years of this sort of dedicated work are not going to be neutralized overnight, so be ready for much more where the missiles till now came from.
• To emphasize the dynamic nature of their resources, Hizbollah suffered the loss of four large truckloads of weapons and munitions 'neutralized' by IDF action when they were intercepted on the road into Lebanon from Syria. Rather laconically, the army's comment on this says: "Syria is not a target. Messages have, however, been relayed to the Syrians and we hope that this phenomenon stops." Amen.

It's unlikely the fear, uncertainty and doubt that come with moments like this are translating well via the media.