According to Palestinian officials in the Gaza Strip, senior members of the Islamic Jihad organization in Damascus and Lebanon went underground following the assassination of a senior member of the Islamic Jihad organization in Damascus on March 19.
Foreign sources said that he was assassinated by agents of the Israeli Mossad.
It seems that Israel has landed a pre-emptive strike on the Islamic Jihad organization ahead of the month of Ramadan in order to reduce the terrorist attacks it is planning against Israeli targets.
The senior who was killed is Ali Ramzi Alaswad, 31 years old, a chemical engineer who joined the Islamic Jihad in 2005 and reached a senior command position in its military wing.
His assassination came a day after the Organization’s Secretary General Ziyad Al-Nakhallah met in Beirut, Lebanon with Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah to coordinate terrorist activities against Israel during the month of Ramadan.
Ali Ramzi Alaswad was killed at the door of his house in the Qudsiya neighborhood in the Damascus area, 2 unknown men ambushed him in the morning near his car, when he left his house they shot 30 bullets at him, according to the pathologist’s report he was also stabbed with a knife after the shooting, probably to ensure his death.
Ali Alaswad was involved in planning attacks against Israel in the coming weeks, the Israeli Mossad followed him for a long time, security officials in Israel refused to answer the question of whether he was connected to the large bomb attack that was planted last week at the Megiddo Junction.
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu alluded to his assassination in what he said at the weekly cabinet meeting, We are reaching out to the terrorists and the architects of terrorism everywhere, Netanyahu emphasized.
According to well informed sources, Israel has decided to renew the assassinations of the senior members of the terrorist organizations in Syria and Lebanon that operate terrorism in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. The assassinations are quiet and are carried out without Israel’s fingerprints and taking responsibility on its part, and they help Israel maintain relative peace in the Gaza Strip without provoking the Palestinians.
The close connection to IRAN
Under the guidance of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, Hezbollah and the Palestinian terrorist organizations are preparing for a new wave of terrorism ahead of the month of Ramadan, Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah met this week in Beirut with the leaders of Hamas and Islamic Jihad to coordinate terrorist activities in the coming weeks.
The Israeli security establishment is very concerned about the continued growth of terrorist groups in the northern West Bank, the Islamic Jihad organization has established 9 new armed terrorist groups in the northern West Bank, these groups receive financial aid and weapons from Iran.
The Islamic Jihad organization has been leading the terrorist operations in the northern West Bank since the end of the IDF operation in the Gaza Strip in May 2021 and following the escape of 6 terrorists from Gilboa prison to the Jenin area in September 2021, five of whom were from the Islamic Jihad.
According to senior security officials, the person responsible for the establishment of these terrorist groups is Akram Al-Ajouri, the head of the Islamic Jihad’s military wing in coordination with Iran’s Revolutionary Guards.
It was the Iranians who developed the establishment of the new terrorist groups after the establishment of the Jenin Battalion group on a local initiative.
Who is Akram Al-Ajouri?
On November 13, 2019, Israel tried to kill the senior Islamic Jihad leader Akram Al-Ajouri at his home in Damascus. Al-Ajouri is a member of the political bureau of the Islamic Jihad organization and head of the Supreme Military Council.
He survived the Israeli Air Force attack on his home but his son Moaz was killed.
Al-Ajouri was born in the Gaza Strip, he has 3 sons and he held important positions in the organization, in September 2018 he was elected as a member of the political bureau of the organization.
In the organization’s internal elections, he came in second place after Ziyad Al-Nakhala, who was elected the organization’s secretary-general. He is also the head of the Shura Council and is responsible for the organization’s funds, which come mainly from Iran.
Akram Al-Ajouri had close relations with General Qassem Soleimani, commander of the Quds Force who was killed by the US military.
In Iraq, together with the organization’s Secretary General Ziyad Al-Nakhla, he met in Tehran with General Hossein Salami, commander of the Revolutionary Guards, to coordinate the organization’s military activities in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip.
The person who helped him establish the new terrorist groups in the West Bank was Sheikh Bassam Al-Saadi from the refugee camp in Jenin, one of the leaders of the Islamic Jihad organization, he was arrested by the IDF and his arrest was one of the reasons that led to the IDF’s major operation against the Islamic Jihad in the Gaza Strip last summer.
Al-Ajouri moves between Iran, Syria and Lebanon and maintains military ties with senior officials of the Iranian regime and the Hezbollah organization.
Al-Ajouri is considered number 2 in the organization and the most powerful person after Secretary General Ziyad Nakhale and has great influence in the Gaza Strip.
According to the security officials, there are already several hundred armed terrorists in the Jenin area operating in several groups that mainly belong to the Islamic Jihad organizations and the Fatah, the IDF’s large arrest operation is not enough to curb the wave of terrorism even though it had successes.
In the Islamic Jihad, they fear a large operation by the IDF in the Jenin area against the terrorist groups, and also another attempt to assassinate Akram Al-Ajouri as soon as there is an operational opportunity for this, he is now the head of the snake that operates the terrorism in the Jenin and Nablus areas.
Israel is entering a very sensitive security period and the targeted killings in the West Bank, the Gaza Strip and abroad are an integral part of the tools that Israel uses for deterrence and also to fight against terrorism, Israel has a bank of targets at the top of the terrorist organizations, these are senior terrorists who plan to harm Israeli citizens and its security forces.
