Palestinian West Bank, Israel’s East Brink
By Amir Oren
When Israel’s Internal Security Agency, widely known by its Hebrew acronym SHABAK, announced the apprehendion by military and border police units of Muntasir Shalby, a suspect in a recent killing of an 19-year-old student at West Bank bus stop, the most important line was couched in negative terms: Shalby, a gray-beard 44-year-old family man, “has no organizational affiliation”.
The Israeli Defense dragnet, weaving together in a seamless fashion Army, Military Intelligence, SHABAK, police and civil administration elements, has vastly improved its counter-terror performance over the last several years, combining technology and creativity. Contrary to usual battle-field engagements and fire-fights, which take place over terrain impossible to pinpoint in advance, the West Bank is a series of crime scenes waiting for the crime to take place. The traffic routes can be covered by a network of surveillance devices much like every modern city or highway, capturing the image of the perpetrators and leading the security detectives chasing them.
This, however, only helps zeroing in on the suspects, which may add to the Israeli reputation of – in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police motto – “they always get their man”, which could add an ounce of hesitation in the mind of whoever considers their chances of getting away with murder. But this does not seem to be the typical case. Deterrence has to do with other factors, such as the fear of work permits in Israel being revoked for the killer’s family, or their house ordered demolished. This last punitive measure has many experienced opponents within the Israeli decision-making elite, as the suffering brought upon a terrorist’s family could generate hate, vengeance and additional terror acts.
The difference between law enforcement and security is that the former focuses on gathering evidence in order to feed the due process of justice, only rarely and in the case of capital crimes acting on tips to foil the unlawful act, while the latter has to do with prevention. Of course, even what takes place after the crime has value, in forensics and interrogations uncovering cells and methods, but this is small comfort once the various agencies failed to intercept the perpetrators en route to their destination.
The combined IDF-SHABAK system is sophisticated – and Sysiphic. Monitoring routine traffic both physical and digital, in order to note abnormal deviation from regular patterns, it can alert headquarters and even on-scene sentries to an incoming danger, such as an armed squad or a speeding vehicle bent on ramming. But even an extraordinary 90-odd percent success, comparable to anti-missile intercepts or Covid-19 vaccines, is by definition imperfect. As the old British doctrine between World Wars statistically assumed, a “Bomber will always get through” and manage to drop its munitions on target before being shot down or making its way home.
Intelligence for early-warning and round-ups is more easily gathered when there is a clear chain of command, supply and transport – some superior authority, be it political or religious, leading to subordinates, dispatchers, collaborators – or indicators of the would-be terrorist bidding farewell to his comrades and relatives as he (and at times she) sets out on a suicide mission.
But a “lone wolf” is, well, acting alone, or perhaps in conjunction with one ir two loners like him – as in a drive-by shooting, if there is someone else at the wheel and the attack (fire, hand grenade, explosive device) is launched out of the right-side passenger window or door closer to where pedestrians are standing or walking. Fighting wolf-packs is challenging, but catching those who stay away from the pack even more so.
This is a generic fact, not confined to Arabs vs. Israelis, as it was also proven in the opposite direction and in Israelis vs. Israelis incidents. It only takes one Baruch Goldstein to commit a Cave of the Patriarchs (Ibrahimi Mosque) massacre, one Yigal Amir to assassinate a Prime Minister.
The problem should thus be analysed from the other side of the lense. Not how come a Shalby succeeds in killing one victim and injuring two, but why is that so rare – and could circumstances change to make it much more frequent, swelling up to a terror wave.
The occupied West Bank administered by the Palestinian Authority has economic and social tensions of its own, plus the political ones having to do with the on-again, off-again elections coming up (or not). It is also tied to the Israeli-annexed East Jerusalem and the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip. Whatever happens in one of these areas impacts the others. And of course, resistance to the Jewish settlements may at times seem dormant, but is always a major cause for friction.
Then there are the outside influences. A Trump announcement on moving the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and closing down the Consulate-General (effectively the embassy to the West Bank) there. An expected Biden policy to restart the peace process, pending the establishment of a fresh Israeli government. Hopes may be raised, leading to a period of calm – but also to efforts by die-hard (and kill even harder) opponents of compromise on either side. Goldstein’s massacre, the first major terror act after the Oslo Declaration of Principles was signed, brought about the series of retaliatory Palestinians terror acts and irreparably damaged Oslo – precisely what the murderous M.D. intended.
The IDF, of which SHABAK and MOSSAD are mere auxiliary organisations when it comes to real war, fought by force-on-force, has devoted enormous resources to constabulary missions in the West Bank, Gaza and – or across from – Lebanon. These secondary fronts have become its main ones. It is a national, political-echellon directed mission rather than a purely military one, with professional, ethical and social repercussions.
Fortunately for Israel, this threat rather than a mere nuisance did not start immediately after the 1967 war and the occupation of the territories, save in Gaza where there remained Palestinians elements armed by the defeated Egyptian Army. The Intifada waited an entire generation, 20 years, to be unleashed on Israel. One shudders at the thought of the 1973 war, when Israeli forces were stretched to the limit in the Sinai and the Golan Heights and a huge effort was directed at Jordan to prevent it from opening a third front, if there was also a Palestinian uprising. In a future war, this worst-case scenario could come to pass, no matter how sophisticated the Israeli security system is.