10th September, 2024
The first Intifada began in December 1987 and ended in September 1993 with the signing of the first Oslo Accords, which provided a framework for peace negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. The second intifada, sometimes called the Al-Aqsa intifada, began in September 2000. Although no single event signaled its end, most analysts agree that it had run its course by late 2005. The two uprisings resulted in the death of more than 5,000 Palestinians and some 1,400 Israelis.
The proximate causes of the first intifada were intensified Israeli land expropriation and settlement construction in the West Bank and Gaza Strip after the electoral victory of the right-wing party in 1977; increasing Israeli repression in response to heightened Palestinian protests following the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982; the emergence of a new cadre of local Palestinian activists who challenged the leadership of the (PLO), a process aided by Israel’s stepped-up attempts to curb political activism and break the PLO’s ties to the occupied territories in the early 1980s; and, in reaction to the invasion of Lebanon, the emergence of a strong peace camp on the Israeli side, which many Palestinians thought provided a basis for change in Israeli policy.
With motivation, means, and perceived opportunity in place, only a precipitant was required to start an uprising. This occurred in December 1987 when an Israeli vehicle struck two vans carrying Palestinian workers, killing four of them, an event that was perceived by Palestinians as an act of revenge for the death by stabbing of an Israeli in Gaza a few days earlier. Most of the Palestinian rioting took place during the intifada’s first year, after which the Palestinians shifted from throwing rocks and Molotov cocktails at Israeli targets to attacking them with rifles, hand grenades, and explosives. The shift occurred mainly because of the severity of Israeli military and police reprisals, which intensified after Palestinian attacks became more violent. According to the Israeli group B’Tselem, nearly 2,000 deaths due to violence occurred during the first intifada; the ratio of Palestinian to Israeli deaths was slightly more than 3 to 1.
Pragmatism crystallized alongside the violence, however. In 1988 the PLO accepted American conditions for opening a U.S.-Palestinian dialogue: rejection of terrorism, recognition of Israel’s right to exist, and acceptance of UN Resolutions 242 (which called upon Arab states to accept Israel’s right “to live in peace within secure and recognized boundaries”) and Resolution 338 (which called for the implementation of Resolution 242 “in all its parts”). With the intifada proving to be politically and economically damaging to Israel, a new Israeli government was elected in 1992 with a mandate to negotiate for peace. In the following year secret talks between Israel and the PLO under the auspices of the Norwegian government resulted in the Oslo Accords, a series of agreements signed in 1993–95. The accords reiterated the PLO’s 1988 commitments, and Israel recognized the PLO as the Palestinian people’s legitimate representative, agreed to withdraw in stages from areas of the West Bank and Gaza, and allowed the creation of a Palestinian Authority to govern those areas. Outstanding matters in achieving a “two-state’ solution was to be settled over the next five years.
Negotiations and Continued Violence
Just as the PLO turned to pragmatism, however, a new organization- Hamas- headed in the opposite direction, articulating a vision of an Islamic state in all of historical Palestine. Hamas rejected the Oslo Accords and, in a move to scuttle peace talks, initiated a series of suicide attacks against Israeli targets.
Meanwhile, Israel continued to build settlements in the occupied territories, and the Palestinians imported arms and built up their security forces. As a result, talks broke down in 2000 in a wave of frustration and mutual recrimination. Shortly afterward, Likud’s prime ministerial candidate, Ariel Sharon visited Al Aqsa compound Jerusalem as an assertion of Israel’s sovereignty over Al Aqsa Mosque, Islam’s third holiest site. Rioting broke out, Israeli police responded with lethal force, and unrest quickly spread throughout the occupied territories. The second intifada had begun.
The second intifada was much more violent than the first. During the approximately five-year uprising, more than 4,300 fatalities were registered, and again the ratio of Palestinian to Israeli deaths was slightly more than 3 to 1. In March 2002, following an especially horrific suicide bombing that killed 30 people; the Israeli army launched Operation Defensive Shield to reoccupy the West Bank and parts of Gaza. One year later Israel started building a separation barrier in the West Bank to match a similar barrier erected in Gaza in 1996. Also helping to suppress the uprising were more than 200 state-directed assassinations of Palestinian military operatives and political leaders.
Although the violence had nearly subsided by the end of 2005, the conditions causing it had in some respects worsened. Settlement activity in the West Bank continued, and tight controls were placed on the movement of Palestinian goods and people, stifling economic growth. Negotiations were at a standstill. In addition, the Palestinian Authority lost support amid charges of widespread corruption. Many Palestinians now turned to Hamas, which won the 2006 legislative elections and took power by force in Gaza in 2007.
It was around this time that Israel poisoned Arafat, the leader of the PLO. This move was intended to allow Hamas to take over the Gaza Strip, which would then allow Israel to destroy the Strip, using Hamas as a terrorist entity as an excuse, in order to steal Gaza’s off shore gas fields. With a leaderless PLO, both Israel and the CIA manipulated the current leader –Abbas – to become the new head of the PLO. The entity then changed its name to the Palestinian Authority. The PA would become Israel’s police and spy force suppressing the Palestinians in the West Bank.
The Israeli Plot to Pit the West Bank Resistance against the PA
In a bid to undermine resistance groups in the occupied West Bank, Israel is strategically targeting key individuals to incite discord between armed factions and the Palestinian Authority, intensifying an already volatile situation marked by unprecedented violence and political maneuvering. After failing to destroy resistance factions in the occupied West Bank, Israeli forces plan to target specific individuals to create tensions between the armed groups and the Palestinian Authority (PA). This effort includes an alleged meeting held in Tel Aviv between Hussein al-Sheikh, head of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO)’s executive committee, and Major General Ghasan Alyan, head of Israel’s Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT).
The Tel Aviv trip by Sheikh, the man favored by Israel to lead the PA once President Mahmoud Abbas retires, was organized to discuss methods of “de-escalating tensions and allowing West Bank workers to travel into Israeli territory for work,” according to an anonymous source in his office.
The Rise of West Bank Resistance
More than 650 Palestinians have been killed in the occupied West Bank since 7 October, making the past eleven months the most violent period there since the Second Intifada. Although the Hamas-led Operation Al-Aqsa Flood was formally staged in the Gaza Strip, the fighting in the northern West Bank has now coalesced into what can be called a second Palestinian front against the Israeli military.
Since the start of the war in Gaza, there have also been quantitative jumps in the complexity of ambushes and the effectiveness of explosive charges manufactured by resistance groups in the West Bank.
Many of the Resistance groups , as we know them today, were formed in the wake of the events of May 2021, when Hamas led its 11-day ’Sword of Jerusalem’ battle against the Israeli military. Simultaneously, the concept of the ‘Unity of Fronts,’ emerged in defense of Al-Aqsa Mosque across occupied Palestine, and the ‘Joint Operations Room of Resistance Factions’ was established. Initially they were consisting of only a few dozen young armed men from the Jenin Refugee Camp, by September of that year, a group organized by Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ)’s armed wing, the Quds Brigades, would officially declare themselves the Jenin Brigade. What was interesting about the Jenin Brigade was that despite being led by PIJ, it also included members from the Fatah-aligned Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, along with members of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine (DFLP), and Hamas armed wings.
Israel’s knee-jerk response was to raid Jenin and kill both fighters and civilians, triggering conflict even more broadly. In February 2022, Israeli Special Forces carried out an assassination of three Palestinians traveling in a civilian car in Nablus, who were later identified as members of the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades.
On 31 March 2022, after several “lone-wolf” attacks against Israelis, the military announced “an operation in the West Bank. This operation would begin with arrest campaigns, focusing clearly on the areas where the newly formed resistance groups emerged, which had begun expanding beyond the area of Jenin by that time. The operation, formulated from an earlier Israeli strategy to combat the Resistance between October 2015 and early 2016, inflicted mass civilian casualties and only succeeded at encouraging the growth of the armed resistance groups. The Israeli military’s violence played a large role in fueling armed struggle in Nablus and would later give birth to the armed faction, formally announced in the Old City of Nablus in October 2022.
In early 2023, when it had become apparent that Palestinian armed resistance groups were effectively taking control of areas like the Jenin Refugee Camp and the Old City of Nablus, US security coordinator Michael Fenzel proposed a “ deal ” to the PA. The proposal, dubbed the “Fenzel Plan,” was reportedly accepted by the PA and included the US-backed formation of a special PA force to counter the armed groups and retake security control in the northern West Bank.
Israel’s Divide and Rule Strategy
While this was underway, Tel Aviv was already working on implementing its own divide-and-rule strategy to sow chaos between Palestinians in the West Bank. Israel had already begun arresting PA officers involved with the resistance back in November 2022.
Then, in the summertime of 2023, they arrested a Palestinian intelligence officer who was coordinating on the ground between the PIJ and Fatah groups. According to two PA sources who wish to remain unnamed, the Fenzel Plan has now been effectively forgotten and won’t proceed, allegedly due to the PA’s strained relationship with Washington. The Palestinian resistance groups in the West Bank may fight under the same banners in many cases but have varying relations and predicaments with the PA throughout the territory. In Jenin, for instance, many of the fighters belonging to Jenin Brigade were the sons of high-ranking PA-linked figures, like Fathi Khazem while many others were actually PA Security Force (PASF) -officers who had chosen the path of armed resistance.
In early 2023, the interconnectivity between the PASF and Jenin Brigade was such that a direct line of communication via handheld radios allowed for continuous coordination when needed. It appears the Israelis caught on to this and cracked down, as the obvious ties between the resistance and local PA forces made it difficult to characterize the fighters as bandits or outlaws seeking to violently challenge the PA’s security control.
During the second invasion of Jenin, after the beginning of the Gaza war, Israel arrested all the Fatah members who were dual fighters and PA security officers who were not going to work, and people who were part of al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades. That was the main point when they began arresting senior figures coordinating between armed groups and the Palestinian Authority. There is always going to be tensions in any place or any city where there are two armed forces because you are taking away the Palestinian Authority’s influence and their ability to enforce the law in the area.
The Tulkarem Brigade, which finds itself in a different predicament than Jenin and operates in an area with greater tensions with the PA. The fighters of this brigade often conceal their identities, and the PA forces there cannot distinguish between fighters and criminal elements. This is especially the case when it comes to issues of weapons transfers into the city, and can often cause confusion in a setting where the PA is tasked with managing security there. There are, however, blatant examples, especially in Tulkarem, of PA forces outrageously opening fire upon resistance fighters and confiscating their weapons from them. A source from Tulkarem, speaking on the condition of anonymity, reveals that the financing and ammunition that supplies Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades there reach these fighters through the PIJ’s armed wing in the city. This information matched what local journalists from Nablus and Tulkarem had also come to understand, further demonstrating the interconnectivity between the resistance factions.
Last year, a group emerged from Tulkarem’s Nour Shams refugee camp, calling itself Jund Allah and stating it was independent of any political party. However, after a number of their fighters were killed during Israeli incursions into the camp, this group later evolved into a small Qassam Brigades (armed wing of Hamas) aligned group. While the PA will allow PIJ-aligned fighters to exist, they have little tolerance for anyone belonging to Hamas. Once it was understood that the PIJ was aiding Hamas-aligned fighters in Tulkarem, this caused further friction with the PA. On 6 November, Israel decided to kill the 24-year-old leader of Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades in Tulkarem, named Jihad Ishhadeh, whose father is a Brigadier General in the PA’s security forces and is known to be friendly toward PA President Mahmoud Abbas. This is again an example of the Israeli occupation forces specifically going after fighters who maintain strong connections with the ruling PA.
The Nablus Equation
When the group known as the Lions’ Den emerged from the Old City of Nablus, it was a major cause for concern in both the PA and Israeli security establishments. Having witnessed the power that the Jenin Brigade had generated and the fact that they were able to openly hold military parades in Jenin City, the fear arose that this could soon be the case in Nablus and that it could lead to resistance fighters emulating this model in other cities too. Nablus, unlike Jenin, is surrounded by Israeli settlements and military sites that are more open to armed attacks. The Lions’ Den emerged as a group that managed to command enormous support throughout occupied Palestine and even into the refugee camps in Lebanon. Formed of young fighters from a range of Palestinian factions, it formed alliances with other resistance groups in the surrounding refugee camps, like Balata camp.
It didn’t take the Israeli military long to begin carrying out assassinations and large-scale attacks in attempts to break up the Lions’ Den. For instance, Tamir al-Kilani, one of the founding members of the Lions’ Den and a member of the PFLP’s armed wing, the Martyr Abu Ali Mustafa Brigades, was killed in an Israeli booby-trapped motorbike explosion. Many of the Lions’ Den’s leading members, affiliated with the PIJ movement, were active during various invasions of Nablus, while the PA arrests a resistance fighter wanted by the Shin Beth, Musab Shtayyeh, the most prominent Hamas member who helped lead the group.
This left a much less diverse crowd of fighters to lead the Lions’ Den, who were commanded by Oday al-Azizi. Unlike Hamas members, some Fatah-affiliated fighters are given the option to remain under PA detention temporarily, avoiding assassination and arrest by the Israeli occupation forces. Azizi, who is married to a woman from a prominent family loyal to PA President Abbas, is also a PA security officer himself and has worked to manage the relationship between the PA and the Lions’ Den for some time. However, the Lions’ Den gradually saw its power decline and was left isolated due to its difficult predicament. The US Biden administration has just recently targeted the group with sanctions for its participation in armed activities in the West Bank, but it now plays a marginal role, if any.
Despite Israeli attempts to disband the resistance groups throughout the West Bank and to sever their ties to local PA elements to encourage internecine fighting, the groups persist. Whether they will expand their operations in the near future is contingent on their ability to navigate their way through a complicated environment, evading persecution from the PA and the Israeli military while implementing more sophisticated tactics and developing greater weapons capabilities.
Over the past few days, Israeli forces under the instruction of the Benjamin Netanyahu government have carried out violent raids in the occupied territories of the West Bank, internationally recognised as part of Palestine. During these raids, the occupation forces have claimed to be killing “terrorists” and “militants” as part of a “counter-terrorism operation”, but Palestine’s mission to the UN stated that the IOF have “invaded homes, deliberately targeted civilians, destroyed vital infrastructure and even besieged the four main hospitals in the area”.
The sudden decision to wage war against the occupied West Bank comes simultaneously with the ongoing war on Gaza. The current Israeli invasion of the already-occupied West Bank has exposed the stark reality of Israel and its decades-long occupation of Palestine: the extent of extremism within its government, the repetitive and ineffective tactics of its army, the diminishing ‘authority’ of Mahmoud Abbas, the obsolescence of the Oslo Accords, the increased pressure on the Jordanian monarchy, and the undeniable complicity of the US in these daily atrocities. This major offensive in the West Bank – the occupation state launches the largest occupied West Bank offensive since the 2nd Intifada ended in 2002 – carries profound implications. As the Israeli government continues its 11th month of war against the Gaza Strip, it has expanded its genocidal campaign to another part of historic Palestine, signaling a new phase of conflict akin to a ‘Gaza 2.0.’
Gaza 2.0
By attacking the West Bank, Israel has made clear that its actions against Gaza were not solely a reaction to last year’s Hamas-led resistance operation, Al-Aqsa Flood, but are part of a broader strategy to “Judaize” all of Palestine, as Palestinian resistance groups have continuously stated since the latest war erupted.
During the latest session of the Israeli government’s weekly meeting, Israeli Minister of Environmental Protection Idit Silman placed the cities of Jenin and Nablus in the same category as the Gaza–Egypt border and reiterated Israel’s right to all of Palestine, stating: “ In the Philadelphi Corridor, in Jenin and Nablus, we must attack in order to inherit the land; this the term that must be used, not the term’ occupation’ of the land.” The same day, Minister of Settlements and National Missions Orit Strook called on Israel’s Military Secretary and security cabinet to “declare a state of war in the West Bank.” Indeed, the factors driving the current explosion in the West Bank mirror those that ignited Gaza. Since the war on Gaza began, Israel has intensified its brutal tactics in the West Bank: over 650 Palestinians have been killed, including over 150 children. The occupation forces have conducted more than 10,300 operations, accompanied by an increase in settlement activity and the distribution of tens of thousands of weapons to settler gangs, further escalating attacks on indigenous Palestinian communities.
The Palestinian Resistance in the West Bank, especially in has been actively confronting the invading Israeli occupation forces, causing direct injuries and casualties among them through the use of machine guns and explosive devices. The death toll from Israel’s brutal operation in the West Bank has risen to at least 40. The toll includes 19 in Jenin, eight in Tulkarem, four in Tubas, and three in Hebron. In total, 685 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank since 7 October. Israel began current West Bank operation on 28 August.
Security officials told Israel Hayom newspaper on 3 September that the Israeli army has internally classified the West Bank as a “war zone” and the occupied West Bank as “the second most critical front, immediately after Gaza.” “The Jenin operation is just the beginning,” security officials told the Israeli daily, adding that ongoing raids in the northern West Bank are “set to continue in the foreseeable future.” “The IDF aims to reach October, the month of major Jewish holidays, with a calmer West Bank than the current mini-uprising unfolding on the ground. While a full-scale war across extensive areas is unlikely, Operation ’Summer Camps’ is expected to expand to other West Bank regions soon,” it added.
Despite these warnings, the occupation state has learned little from its short past. Israel’s ongoing campaign in the West Bank continues to employ – (most recently and notably, Tulkarem’s destruction (especially in Jenin and Tulkarem), imprisonment, intimidation, land confiscation, and the demolition of homes and infrastructure – all in a futile attempt to uproot Palestinian resistance, which has been developing its capabilities despite harsh, repressive conditions. The current aggression, driven by the ultra-nationalist factions within the Israeli government, is a calculated move to exert control over the West Bank, similar to its brutal tactics in Gaza. As Foreign Minister Israel Katz stated: “We must deal with the threat just as we deal with the terrorist infrastructure in Gaza, including the temporary evacuation of Palestinian residents and whatever steps are required. This is a war for everything and we must win it.”
At least for the short-term, Israel has been emboldened by favorable conditions: widespread support among the Israeli public for aggressive actions, the need for Netanyahu’s government to claim an internal “victory,” and a sense of impunity bolstered by the lack of effective US or Arab deterrence.
Opening the Floodgates of Resistance
The occupation state’s largest West Bank raid since 2002 reveals that its strategy is not just a reaction to isolated events but a broader campaign to dismantle Palestinian society and resistance and deny their right to self-determination and autonomy. The invasion is not merely a continuation of the response to Al-Aqsa Flood; rather, it is part of a larger effort to target Palestinians wherever they are and break their morale. The tactics employed in Gaza – destruction, devastation, and death – are being replicated, albeit to a lesser degree, in the West Bank, despite the killings and the resistance it has fomented.
The West Bank has witnessed not only a rise in conventional resistance operations (coordinated by Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad), such as shootings, stabbings, ambushes, and ramming attacks, but also the return of suicide bombings and the emergence of the use of car bombs for the first time.
Israeli leaders and ultra-nationalist factions have long advocated for inflicting severe pain on Palestinians, and Netanyahu now sees an opportunity to achieve this through a new wave of violence in key West Bank cities like Jenin, Tulkarem, Tubas, Nablus, Ramallah, and most recently, Hebron. Jenin, in particular, the focal point of the 2002 battle (and the more recent ‘Battle of the Fury of Jenin’ in July 2023), is seen as a persistent threat to the occupation entity, namely due to the camp’s residents showing strength which, “Unlike many other cities and villages in the West Bank, the Jenin camp is not characterized by political divisions.”
However, Netanyahu may not have fully assessed the risks. The situation in 2024 is not the same as in 2002; Israel is already engaged on different fronts. If the West Bank is subjected to a ‘Gaza 2.0’ scenario – with systematic destruction, coordinated attacks, and massive displacement – the fragile Palestinian Authority (PA) under Abbas could collapse, burying the Oslo Accords indefinitely and further eroding any prospects for the so-called two-state solution. Abbas faces unprecedented challenges. He is besieged by anger from Palestinians in the West Bank, who are frustrated by the ongoing suffering of their brethren in Gaza, by the financial stranglehold imposed by Israel, and by the relentless expansion of settlements. Criticism of Abbas has reached a crescendo across the West Bank, highlighting a disillusionment with the PA’s inability to protect Palestinian rights or halt repeated Israeli incursions, as well as its unwavering security coordination with the occupation. The collapse of the Oslo Accords would have far-reaching consequences. The international community’s investment in the PA as an alternative to armed struggle would be rendered useless. It would be increasingly difficult to convince any Palestinian or Arab that peace is possible with the current Israeli leadership, which is marked by its ultra-nationalist and militaristic stance.
The War Beyond the West Bank
The crisis is not limited to the Palestinian territories. In Jordan, King Abdullah II faces growing challenges as the Israeli invasion of the West Bank threatens to destabilize his kingdom. Amman, much like Ramallah, is caught in a web of conflicting pressures – unable to sever ties with Israel or fully align with Palestinian resistance, and now potentially facing a refugee crisis if Palestinians are displaced en masse from the West Bank.
It is easy to envision the Jordanian king becoming ensnared in a wave of public outrage if this scenario unfolds. This is not mere speculation. Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz, for instance, has underscored the strategic significance of Israel’s actions in the West Bank by claiming that Iran is attempting to establish a “terrorist front” there, similar to those in Gaza and Lebanon. Arming the West Bank resistance is a long-standing ambition of the Islamic Republic, which has been conducting a covert smuggling operation over the past two years. Other Arab nations that have signed peace treaties or normalized ties with Israel – i.e., Egypt, UAE, Morocco, and Bahrain – can find themselves in a similar position as Amman if the Israeli onslaught in the West Bank continues, as Tel Aviv’s actions are a direct affront to the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative, ratified by the Arab League as recently as 2017. This initiative, which Saudi Arabia has placed at the heart of a long-sought Israel normalization deal, calls for a full withdrawal of the Israeli army from the occupied territories (including the West Bank, Gaza, the Golan Heights, and Lebanon), a “just settlement” of the Palestinian refugee crisis based on UN Resolution 194, and the establishment of a Palestinian state with East Jerusalem as its capital.
Instead, the number of Jewish settlers in the West Bank has skyrocketed from roughly 70,000 in 2002 to 800,000 in 2024, leaving no room for the ‘Palestinian state’ that normalizing Arab countries so claim to be are working towards.
What Netanyahu is doing now serves as nothing more than a catalyst for Israel’s inevitable end and this is demonstrated by his true desire to bury the idea of a promised Palestinian state, as is shown through Israel’s actions in both the West Bank and the Gaza Strip. As Israel pushes forward with its aggressive agenda, the US stance has also come into sharper focus. With significant military deployments in the region and continued support for Israeli actions, Washington’s tacit approval – gives Netanyahu the latitude to escalate the conflict further, potentially at the expense of regional stability. Netanyahu’s pursuit of power through forceful means risks provoking a regional earthquake akin to the aftermath of the 1948 Nakba, potentially destabilizing US-backed autocrats and igniting new waves of resistance not just in the West Bank but across the region.
The ongoing violence in the West Bank is not just another episode of this battle; it is a dangerous escalation that could reshape the geopolitical order of the region.
Israeli Government to Finance Al-Aqsa Storming in first
The Israeli government has committed to financing the invasion and the construction of a synagogue at the Al Aqsa compound, by illegal Israeli settlers, marking an inflammatory first for the Israeli regime. The office of “Heritage” Minister Amichai Eliyahu, an extremist known for his anti-Palestinian stance, will allocate two million NIS (approximately $545,000) for this controversial project slated for implementation in the coming weeks. Ben Gvir reiterated his policy of allowing Israeli settlers to perform prayers inside the al-Aqsa Mosque; and emphasized that Netanyahu was aware of this policy prior to the formation of the coalition government. The inflammatory nature of the plan is exacerbated because it contradicts Netanyahu’s repeated claims of preserving the status quo at al-Aqsa Mosque. The status quo, established before the Israeli occupation of eastern al-Quds in 1967, placed the holy site under the authority of the Islamic Waqf of al-Quds, affiliated with the Jordanian Ministry of Endowments.
However, since 2003, Israeli authorities have altered this arrangement by allowing settlers to enter the al-Aqsa Mosque without the approval of the Islamic Waqf, with the latter repeatedly calling for an end to these incursions. In a further escalation, he suggested that Jews have the right to pray at Al-Aqsa Mosque, even going so far as to propose the within the compound, marking yet another first. Ben-Gvir’s statements come a couple of weeks after hundreds of settlers, including the Israeli police minister, under the protection of occupation police forces. The Islamic Endowments Department in al-Quds reported that 2,200 settlers stormed the Al-Aqsa Mosque at the end of August, marking what is known as the anniversary of the “destruction of the temple.” At the time, the settlers raised the entity’s flag inside the Al-Aqsa Mosque at Bab al-Silsila while carrying out provocative tours inside the holy mosque. It is noteworthy that in early July, violated the status of the Al Aqsa, at the so-called “Jerusalem Day Flag March,” Israeli “sovereignty” over the Al-Aqsa Mosque. “Temple Mount is ours, Damascus Gate is ours, let the whole world know that,”he said, adding, “Today, according to my policy, Jews entered the Old City freely; and on the Temple Mount Jews prayed freely. We say in the simplest way, it’s ours.” His plan aims to alter the status quo at the Mosque by taking control of the site and allowing access to Israeli settlers.
The reasoning behind the recent invasion of the West Bank and the storming by the IOF of the Al Aqsa compound was a deliberate provocation. Having failed to provoke Egypt – through its occupation of the Rafah crossing and the Philadelphi Corridor, and Iran ( through several high profile assassinations), Israel turned its attention to the West Bank – this time trying to provoke Jordan (even though it’s an ally of Israel) , and the wider Arab and Muslim world by storming Al Aqsa. All the while, Israel is internally fracturing. And, this is the title of our next article – “A fractured Israel on the verge of collapse”
