Shin Bet chief Ronen Bar revealed on May 9th that Israel thwarted the activity of a cell of the Islamic Jihad that was engaged in the production of rockets in the Jenin area.
During a press conference with Prime Minister Netanyahu, Defense Minister Galant and Chief of Staff Halevi, Bar said:
“In the last few weeks, for example, we thwarted a squad in the Jenin refugee camp area, which had already started producing rockets and a launcher in order to fire rockets from Samaria towards Israel.”
In the Palestinian media, a video was published this week showing the firing of a Qassam type rocket in the Jenin area, apparently it is the experiments of the same squad, which, as mentioned, was captured by the Shin Bet.
The Israeli security establishment fears the turning of Judea and Samaria, and especially the Jenin and Tulkarm area, which are very close to the major cities in Israel, into areas where rocket production and launch sites will be established like in the Gaza Strip.
The IDF’s “Protective Shield” operation in March 2002 restored to Israel the full freedom of security action within the Palestinian cities in Judea and Samaria and allowed the Shin Bet to arrest or kill terrorist cells engaged in the production of rockets in Judea and Samaria.
Security sources in Israel say that the armed groups of the Islamic Jihad in Jenin and Nablus are also trying to turn ordinary drones into attack drones by attaching explosive charges to them.
Since the end of the IDF’s major operation in the Gaza Strip in May 2021 (“Guardian of the Walls”), the Islamic Jihad has begun to establish armed terrorist groups in northern Samaria called “battalions” in coordination with Iran.
For this purpose, Ziyad Al-Nakhala, the Secretary General of the Islamic Jihad, traveled to Tehran and met with General Hossein Salami, commander of the Revolutionary Guards, to receive funding from him and coordinate the smuggling of weapons to Judea and Samaria through Jordan.
The Islamic Jihad’s attempt to manufacture rockets in Judea and Samaria and launch them at major cities in Israel is another step in implementing the doctrine of General Qasem Soleimani to surround Israel with a stranglehold of hundreds of thousands of rockets, missiles and drones from all fronts.
The mastermind-Tarek Izz a-Din
The head of the Shin Bet Ronan Bar revealed that the terrorist squad that planned to produce rockets in the Jenin area was directed by the senior Islamic Jihad leader Tarek Izz a-Din, who was killed this week in an IDF operation in the Gaza Strip.
This is a dangerous precedent said Ronen Bar, the members of the arrested squad admitted that they were handled by Tarek Izz a-Din, we have no intention of turning Afula into a target for terrorist attacks, he emphasized.
The assassination of Tarek Izz a-Din is one of the important achievements of the “Shield and Arrow” operation, thanks to which the Israeli security system can disrupt the military establishment of the Islamic Jihad in northern Samaria.
Tarek Izz a-Din was responsible for directing the operations of the Islamic Jihad in Judea and Samaria from the Gaza Strip and at the present time, planned and promoted additional attacks against the residents of the State of Israel.
Tarek Izz a-Din, 49 years old, originally from the village of Araba in Samaria, the same village where the senior Islamic Jihad leader Hader Adnan lived, who died in an Israeli prison on a hunger strike, after refusing to receive medical treatment.
He was a military operative of the Islamic Jihad in the first and second intifadas, he was arrested in 2002 and sentenced to life imprisonment for his responsibility for a suicide attack in the city of Hadera.
He was released from the Israeli prison as part of the “Shalit Deal” in 2011 and deported to the Gaza Strip, during the last few years, he advanced to the command level of the Islamic Jihad in the Gaza Strip.
He was responsible for the connection between the Islamic Jihad in Gaza and the branch of the organization in Judea and Samaria, for the transfer of funds, for inciting and intending to carry out terrorist attacks in the territories of the State of Israel from the Gaza Strip.
Tarek Izz a-Din was very close to Saleh al-Arouri, the head of the military wing of Hamas in Judea and Samaria and had close operational and intelligence cooperation with him in the territories of Judea and Samaria.
The activity of the Shin Bet to thwart the activities of the terrorist groups of the Islamic Jihad in the territories of Judea and Samaria is important, but there is no escape from holding an extensive military operation in northern Samaria in order to arrest and kill the terrorists who have established themselves there during the past two years, otherwise they will move to attacks inside the main cities of Israel.
