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Will the IDF have to go back into Jenin again?

Palestinians are already starting to rebuild their terror infrastructure following Operation Home and Garden.

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

Just three weeks after destroying significant terrorist infrastructure and arresting hundreds of suspects in Jenin, the IDF is already thinking about reentering the Palestinian-controlled city, Ynet reported Wednesday.

Intelligence has discovered that the armed men of the city and adjacent refugee camp are already trying to rebuild their stock of weapons and reconstruct their bomb-making factories, said the report.

“We are nearing the time when we’ll have to go back in again,” said a security official, although the plan would be to launch pinpoint raids of a few hours each, unlike the two-day Operation Home and Garden that involved over 1,000 troops.

“Terrorism is not thwarted in one operation,” the source explained. “Jenin must be entered to carry out these operations from time to time and to foil the attempts to reestablish terrorism in the refugee camp.”

The ideal for the IDF would be if the Palestinian Authority regained control of the city, as it is very much in the interest of both Israel and the PA to prevent Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad, both supported by Iran, from taking over. Almost half of the local residents already say they support one of those two terror organizations.

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PA President Mahmoud Abbas flew to Jenin following the operation in a Jordanian helicopter to deliver a speech of Palestinian unity, praising the “steadfast” resistance of the “heroic camp” to the Israeli “aggression.” He also pledged to rebuild the areas that were damaged in the clashes in an attempt to send a signal about who is in charge. At the same time, PA forces started cracking down on its arch-rivals’ operatives.

The IDF understands that it cannot rely on the PA for the country’s security. Its spokesman, Nabil Abu Rudeineh, condemned Israel on Tuesday for the IDF’s killing of three terrorists who had shot at them in the Jenin area, calling it a “murder of three young men” and a “war crime.”

There has been a sharp rise in terrorist attacks this year overall. According to the records of emergency service Rescuers Without Borders, there have been 101 shootings alone at Israeli civilians in the first six months of 2023, more than in all of last year. There have also been 2,118 cases of rock-throwing, 799 attacks with Molotov cocktails, 18 attempted stabbings and six car-rammings, all of which have resulted in 28 Israelis losing their lives and 362 being injured.

Most recently, Palestinian terrorists claimed they fired a rocket from the Jenin area towards an Israeli moshav on Thursday.

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On Tuesday night, the IDF recorded 32 arrests of Palestinian suspects in searches across Judea and Samaria, which also netted drugs and money as well as weaponry.