Security chiefs said to call for action to prevent spike in West Bank violence
Report indicates defense establishment concerned about return of suicide bombers; TV station claims Jordanian intelligence thwarted truck bombing weeks before Allenby attack
Security chiefs issued a “stern warning” to the cabinet Sunday that Israel “must do everything to avoid another front in the West Bank” amid an increase in terrorist activity originating there, Hebrew media reported Monday.
According to a report on Channel 12 news, the Shin Bet security service is especially concerned about the potential resurgence of suicide bombings.
The report said Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar, and IDF chief Lt. Gen. Herzi Halevi recommended several steps to combat Palestinian terrorism in the West Bank, including increasing the number of prison cells; boosting undercover units able to make arrests; cracking down on illegal entry into Israel; increasing the use of technological surveillance means on roads and intersections in the West Bank; and building a wall along the border with Jordan, which has seen a recent spike in terrorist activity.
The officials also reportedly recommended implementing a Shin Bet plan to bring Palestinian laborers into Israel to ease the West Bank’s economic straits and strictly adhering to the status quo on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, whereby Jews can visit the site but may not hold prayers.
The latter recommendation was ostensibly part of an effort to ingratiate Jordan’s royal palace — the holy site’s custodian — amid Amman’s help in thwarting terror cells. After the Sunday meeting, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the status quo hadn’t changed, and that he had ordered his ministers to seek his permission before visiting the site. Channel 12 said the statement was part of a guarantee to Amman.
The Jordanian border — much of which abuts the West Bank from the east — is Israel’s longest and most porous, and has reportedly been used by Iran-backed cells to smuggle weapons in the West Bank, most recently in an effort to harm Israel’s war effort in Gaza.
Citing three ministers who were at the Sunday meeting, Channel 12 said top security officials warned the cabinet that “what is happening in the West Bank could blow up in all of our faces.”
“The next diversion of troops to the West Bank will be from Gaza,” the officials reportedly said, citing a manpower crunch. “It could hurt the war aims as determined by the cabinet.”
A Jordanian national shot dead three Israeli civilians at the Allenby Bridge border crossing from Jordan to the West Bank on Sunday, a day after the IDF wrapped up a 10-day counterterrorism operation in the territory’s north.
According to Channel 12, some six weeks before the shooting, Jordanian intelligence had thwarted a plan by four Jordanians to place explosives on a truck and detonate it at the same crossing.
The report, which cited non-Israeli sources, said Jordanian intelligence arrested all four in Salt, west of Amman, a month and a half ago, and the cell led the officials to a weapons lab in which several explosive devices were found.
According to the report, the alleged terrorists were not members of Jordan’s sizable Palestinian minority, and the cell was formed locally, rather than being recruited by Iran, Hezbollah or other external forces.
Channel 12 said Jordan did not publicize the incident, in order to avoid triggering public protests, given anti-Israeli sentiment in the kingdom and anger at the government in Amman for cooperating with Israel on security matters.
The report also said that Jordan had busted at least three cells in the past two months, recruited by Hezbollah via the internet, that were intended to carry out actions designed to destabilize the kingdom.
It noted that in June, Jordanian security forces announced they had uncovered and detonated explosives hidden in a commercial warehouse in an industrial area southeast of the capital Amman that they said was part of an Iran-linked plot to destabilize Jordan.
That incident involved large quantities of explosives, allegedly smuggled into Jordan by Iran.
According to the network, Hezbollah has also been recruiting, via the internet, Palestinian cells in the northern West Bank — including Nablus, Jenin, and Tulkarm — also intended to act against Jordan.
With Netanyahu’s consent, senior Israeli security officials gave an explicit assurance to the Royal Hashemite Court in Jordan that the status quo at Jerusalem’s Temple Mount hasn’t changed and will not change, according to Channel 12.
National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir had recently enraged the Muslim world by expressing support for open Jewish prayer, and even the construction of a synagogue, on Islam’s third-holiest site.
