Zvi Yehezkeli, Arab affairs analyst for Channel 13 News, said that Israel, as it stands now, cannot beat back the terror in Judea and Samaria.
In an interview with 103 FM Radio, Yehezkeli explained, "The forces which are operating now in Jenin and Shechem, it's already not a game, it's not the Palestinian Authority but Hamas and Iran. You have a really big issue now, and the question is whether it will lead to a regional war. Every operation that you announce before you start it is doomed to failure. But they've already announced it, it's known. It's not clear to you that Israel will need to do something?"
"First of all, an operation that you tell them about, you already turn them into Stalingrad, you give the Palesitnian Authority permission to respond. Second, you cannot do what you did in 2022, and I was there and I will remind you that three soldiers died from explosives prepared by Islamic Jihad. Afterwards, you leveled the refugee camp in Jenin, you made an empty lot - they rebuilt it and the terror returned.
Later, Yehezkeli said emphatically, "You do not have the ability, in your situation today, from Israel's security paradigm, leadership, and so on, to embark on an operation which will eliminate terror." He added, "Test me on this one. Come to me in another month or two and you'll see that the terror has only increased."
Meanwhile, he added, while the soldiers mapped out terrorists' homes for destruction, "they found a lathe. What's a lathe? Missiles." In Israel's amazing operations by highly specialized units, he noted, "we haven't managed to eliminate terror. The terrorists come, they fire at Jews, and no one stops them. One terrorist escapes forty kilometers away from there and no one discovers him. There is a freedom of movement in the [Palestinian Authority] territories which allows these things. Israel is not part of the game."
When asked why the IDF does not set up surprise checkpoints and why there is less deterrence now than in the past, Yehezkeli said, "This is the policy which [former Defense Minister Benny] Gantz (National Unity) began in the previous government. I am not part of the argument over which government is to blame. I think it is not blame, it is a security viewpoint which exists regarding the [Palestinian Authority] territories, in which you see the Palestinian Authority as a partner and the Palestinian [Authority] residents as people who only want to earn a living. The area is flooded with weapons, the price of an M-16 has dropped by 50% in the past few months and these terrorists came with M-16s."
"It's a security view that says that 'the war is over.' My view says, 'Guys, we are at war, we are in something that is being operated on us.' This is a dead area of democracy. We are a democracy within the Green Line. Within the territories, we are a democracy which does not understand that the Palestinians are waging war against us, we are not capable of dealing with that."
Comparing Israel to the US, he added, "Look at them in their eliminations. We are in a big trap. On the one hand they (the Palestinians) are growing stronger. On the other hand, they protect themselves with the population and a 'refugee' population, so to speak. This situation was written on the wall already many years ago. There's nothing to do. You will need to go in and do it. Quietly, they arm themselves. Quietly, they build infrastructure - it all comes back to the root."
Responding to journalist Erel Segal's claim that, "Israel does not rule in the north and the State of Israel has neglected its sovereignty," Yehezkeli said, "That is not something new. The terror attacks cause us to become angry and talk about it. But what is the message in the neighborhood? There is an entity here that does not agree with your existence and your actions are seen as weakness, that it's permissible to attack Jews. They smell your weakness."
"There needs to be a change here. I doubt the West's ability to understand what war is."