The attack at the entrance to the city of Ariel last Friday night is another painful milestone in the ongoing and expanding Palestinian effort to shed Jewish blood wherever possible.
Ramadan, Jerusalem, and the Temple Mount complex are convenient platforms to create the atmosphere and boost the drive to extend the arm of terror against Israel, by forging awareness of the connection among the various fronts and laboring to maintain a united front of success. Organizations’ efforts, led by Hamas, to train hearts and minds began long before Ramadan. Since May 2021, Hamas has focused on igniting the arena and raising the threshold of terrorism, after what was perceived by their leadership as a highly significant and even precedent-setting cognitive, political, and national achievement.
The Hamas effort, accelerated and intensified during Ramadan 2022, sought to cultivate false perceptions regarding Israel’s alleged intentions to change the status quo on the Temple Mount – to turn it into a divided complex such as at the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron. This effort compounds weak Palestinian Authority control in the West Bank and especially in the northern area; significantly strengthened militant Islamic jihad ideology; a radical, unrestrained, and irresponsible approach toward the local population (the likes of Hamas rule in the Gaza Strip toward the Gaza population) under Iranian auspices and funding; and the heightened motivation of young people, be they affiliated with one of the terrorist organizations or not, to express nationalist and religious sentiment through the murder of Jews.
Jerusalem is the most comfortable and appropriate setting, through which Hamas can also connect with Arab citizens of Israel, or at least with the loyalists of the northern faction of the Islamic Movement. Social networks resonate with the news of the riots on the Temple Mount and present the Israeli security forces as desecrating and occupying this holy site. Likewise broadcast are news of the impressive successes of the Israeli security forces in thwarting terrorist attacks and infrastructure, as some of these end with the deaths of armed terrorist operatives in Palestinian cities and refugee camps.
All of this endows more and more young Palestinians with an ideological motivation for terrorism and a sense of security due to some previous successes, which have created a kind of continuum that, even if interrupted by Israeli security forces' counterterrorism operations, is still highlighted by social networks, shaping cognition and igniting propaganda, will, and further incitement.
These phenomena prompt young people to organize at the local level, in pairs or as individuals, with convenient and relatively easy access to firearms, standard or improvised, and launch a terrorist attack. The attack in Ariel is one such incident, and is by no means the last. The motivation exists, the consciousness is shaped, and the Hamas effort to connect cognition with motivation to create the right atmosphere and to exacerbate the fighting continues. Thus, Israel is expected to make another effort in the face of such volatility. Nor is it inconceivable that it will not be able to evade the obligatory action on the serpent's head for long, even when it is a two-pronged hydra: Yahya Sanwar in Gaza and Saleh al-Arouri outside the Palestinian territories.
The attack at the entrance to the city of Ariel last Friday night is another painful milestone in the ongoing and expanding Palestinian effort to shed Jewish blood wherever possible.
Ramadan, Jerusalem, and the Temple Mount complex are convenient platforms to create the atmosphere and boost the drive to extend the arm of terror against Israel, by forging awareness of the connection among the various fronts and laboring to maintain a united front of success. Organizations’ efforts, led by Hamas, to train hearts and minds began long before Ramadan. Since May 2021, Hamas has focused on igniting the arena and raising the threshold of terrorism, after what was perceived by their leadership as a highly significant and even precedent-setting cognitive, political, and national achievement.
The Hamas effort, accelerated and intensified during Ramadan 2022, sought to cultivate false perceptions regarding Israel’s alleged intentions to change the status quo on the Temple Mount – to turn it into a divided complex such as at the Cave of the Patriarchs in Hebron. This effort compounds weak Palestinian Authority control in the West Bank and especially in the northern area; significantly strengthened militant Islamic jihad ideology; a radical, unrestrained, and irresponsible approach toward the local population (the likes of Hamas rule in the Gaza Strip toward the Gaza population) under Iranian auspices and funding; and the heightened motivation of young people, be they affiliated with one of the terrorist organizations or not, to express nationalist and religious sentiment through the murder of Jews.
Jerusalem is the most comfortable and appropriate setting, through which Hamas can also connect with Arab citizens of Israel, or at least with the loyalists of the northern faction of the Islamic Movement. Social networks resonate with the news of the riots on the Temple Mount and present the Israeli security forces as desecrating and occupying this holy site. Likewise broadcast are news of the impressive successes of the Israeli security forces in thwarting terrorist attacks and infrastructure, as some of these end with the deaths of armed terrorist operatives in Palestinian cities and refugee camps.
All of this endows more and more young Palestinians with an ideological motivation for terrorism and a sense of security due to some previous successes, which have created a kind of continuum that, even if interrupted by Israeli security forces' counterterrorism operations, is still highlighted by social networks, shaping cognition and igniting propaganda, will, and further incitement.
These phenomena prompt young people to organize at the local level, in pairs or as individuals, with convenient and relatively easy access to firearms, standard or improvised, and launch a terrorist attack. The attack in Ariel is one such incident, and is by no means the last. The motivation exists, the consciousness is shaped, and the Hamas effort to connect cognition with motivation to create the right atmosphere and to exacerbate the fighting continues. Thus, Israel is expected to make another effort in the face of such volatility. Nor is it inconceivable that it will not be able to evade the obligatory action on the serpent's head for long, even when it is a two-pronged hydra: Yahya Sanwar in Gaza and Saleh al-Arouri outside the Palestinian territories.