Wetherhorn

Here we are again. Another round of violent confrontation between Israel and ,,, (You can fill in the blank. But this time it’s the Palestinian Islamic Jihad). There are plenty of other countries and organizations that are candidates. Hamas, Hizbullah, Iran, Syria, etc.

This one started from an Islamic Jihad senior operative that had been in an Israeli prison under administrative detention. He tried to get released by going on a hunger strike, something he had done successfully once before. Then, he quickly returned to organizing terror cells, which was why he had been detained before. This time the Israeli government ignored him. No one tried to force feed him. Meals were delivered. He left them untouched. His body objected, and he died.

The terrorist organization he belonged to threatened vengeance (sound familiar?). Eventually they fired a bunch of rockets from Gaza at Israeli cities and towns. No one was hurt. most of the rockets were intercepted by the Israeli Iron Dome defense system. But that wasn’t the end of the story. Israel decided that they had had enough of this kind of behavior, For one reason or another this scenario has been repeated 4 times in the past 3 years. This time, Israel targeted the senior leaders of this terror organization and killed three of them in precisely conducted air strikes that resulted in only five deaths; the three targeted individuals and 2 aides of one of the targets. The PIJ (Palestinian Islamic Jihad) reacted with more rocket fire, leading to the current situation. More about that later.

First a bit about terror organizations in general. They usually have a political agenda and use violence in an attempt to achieve some of their aims. Being a non governmental organization, the terrorists have no responsibility for the civilian population in which they live. This can also be very convenient for the political entity that actually governs the territory they operate from. They can claim they are not responsible (plausible denial)even when the actions or aims of the terrorist groups are encouraged , or even directed, by them. This is very useful for nations that don’t want to give another country a real reason for going to war.

One more item about the background to the current situation. The Hamas terror organization is the current, de facto, government of the Gaza strip. They started out as a pure, and irresponsible, terror group. They wrested control of the Gaza strip from the one time elected Palestinian Authority (who has avoided having another election ever since) and now find themselves facing many of the difficulties that come along when you achieve an aim of gaining political control. The transition for terrorist group to governing authority (or even dictatorship) isn’t always easy.

Hamas realizes it is responsible for the population in Gaza. Hamas normally prefers to avoid direct confrontation with Israel because that’s a battle they know they cannot win. Instead, they encourage others, like the PIJ, to do the dirty work while they try to keep their hands from getting dirty. Hamas doesn’t want to get involved in a direct confrontation, but because of their past support of PIJ, they are reluctant to try to force PIJ to be subservient. When Israel kills PIJ leaders, and pointedly avoids harming Hamas, the Hamas leaderships has a dilemma. The consequences of active support for PIJ could mean losing their political position. Failing to support PIJ means that they are under a lot of pressure from Iran. So far, they have succeeded in keeping out of the fighting.

PIJ is trying to follow the historical scenarios in which they shoot a lot of rockets, and then agree to a cease-fire (negotiated via Egyptian emissaries) in which they claim great success by pointing out that they were the last ones to shoot, and that Israel has agreed to some demands or conditions that they imposed. This time, however, Israel has avoided agreeing to any preconditions during negotiations via the Egyptian intermediaries, So the shooting continues.

As far as the actual conduct of the hostilities is concerned, Israel seems to have excellent intelligence regarding which locations and individuals belong to PIJ and which to Hamas. The Israeli forces are well practiced in making attacks that avoid any casualties to non-combatants. This is not true of the PIJ rocketry. As of the time I am writing this PIJ has launched about 600 rockets at Israeli targets. About one quarter of them failed to make it across the line dividing the Gaza strip from Israel. Those rocket killed at least 4 Gaza strip residents, including 2 children. PIJ would like to blame those deaths on Israel,but they all occurred in places where Israeli forces never attacked. Of the rockets that did manage to get across, over half of them were intercepted by Israeli Iron Dome defense system (and even one by the newer David’s Sling system in its’ operational debut). Almost all the others landed in open fields and unpopulated areas. At least 2 actually struck Israeli homes. One person was killed and about 9 injured.

That’s where things stand right now. A new PIJ senior political representative has arrived in Egypt to direct negotiations. Israel and the PIJ do NOT speak directly to each other. Proposals are passed via Egyptian mediators (who, I have been told, are growing increasingly upset with the PIJ). The people under fire are certainly very distressed, but this little skirmish is quite insignificant compared to the real war between Russia and Ukraine.