Police to face unprecedented challenges, says chief

The police force will face unprecedented international challenges in the coming year as it meets the consequences of the Arab Spring and the ongoing violence across the borders with its neighbors, Police Commissioner Yohanan Danino warned on Tuesday.

“The picture of things in the arena around Israel is one of continued instability,” Danino said at the opening of a police conference on security. “The processes that are under way in the countries of the Arab Spring, the neighboring countries, and the situation in Syria demand from the Israel Police a special preparedness of operational security.”

“We are talking about a new situation, not what was known in the past as the Arab Spring, but a much more problematic and more complicated one,” he said. “Israel is ready to deal with the implications of this situation.”

Danino noted that the police force had closer ties to the Israel Defense Forces and other security services than ever before and was deploying forces at strategic points.