From the Liveblog of
Sunday, May 9, 2021
IDF deploys 3 additional battalions to the West Bank
Add ToI as a Preferred Source on GoogleJudah Ari Gross is The Times of Israel's religions and Diaspora affairs correspondent.
The Israel Defense Forces has deployed an additional three battalions to the West Bank on Sunday as it seeks to curb the growing violence in the area, the military says.
These reinforcements — units that were originally meant to be in training — are on top of the additional four battalions already sent to the West Bank since the start of the month of Ramadan in April.
The military says the additional troops are specifically meant to be deployed along the border between the West Bank and Israel.
The decision was made by IDF Chief of Staff Aviv Kohavi after he visited the West Bank this morning, meeting with local commanders and with Border Police officers who described a recent shooting attack against them in the West Bank, in which three Palestinian gunmen, who had been stopped as they attempted to travel into Israel illegally, opened fire at them with makeshift machine guns. The border guards and IDF troops returned fire, killing two of the men and critically wounding the third.
“Thanks to the soldiers here and especially the Border Police officers, a terror attack was prevented. The soldiers’ finger that squeezed the trigger prevented a terror attack that could have had an impact on the situation in the entire country,” Kohavi says.
The Times of Israel Community.