In the aftermath of back-to-back terrorist attacks – one perpetrated by Jewish terrorists against a Palestinian family, killing an 18-month toddler; and one carried out by a Palestinian terrorist on a mother of three young children – Israeli and Palestinian security officials are seeking signs that the joint security cooperation itself not become a casualty of the growing tension.
Last Friday, the Dawabsha home in the West Bank village of Duma was firebombed, the ensuing flames killing 18-month old Ali and burning his mother and brother over most of their bodies. Israeli officials, including President Rivlin and Prime Minister Netanyahu, wasted no time in issuing unequivocal, public condemnations while law enforcement was greenlighted to apply to the Jewish terror suspects the same controversial rules of administrative detention about which the Palestinians bitterly complain.
In an interview with the Israeli news platform YNet, long-time Palestinian leader and football association head Jibril Rajoub was more candid than his compatriots when he said the strong and unambiguous denunciation across Israeli society resonated with Palestinian leadership and played a major role in withholding calls for revenge. Most Palestinian officials accused the Israelis of systematic inactivity when it comes to investigating crimes committed by other Israelis.
So despite Rajoub’s words, there was no surprise at the almost immediate response of Molotov cocktails being thrown into Israeli traffic, one hitting a vehicle and causing severe burns to the young woman behind the wheel. This, despite the fact that the Palestinian Authority (PA) had ordered its security services in all regions of the West Bank to take precautions to ensure that local youths do not seek revenge in clashes with Israelis forces or civilians.
Referring to Israelis who live in Jewish communities located on land Israel acquired in the 1967 war that is claimed by Palestinians for the Palestinian state-in-formation, Maj. Gen. Adnan Damiri, spokesperson for PA internal security, told a news conference that, “Settlers who commit terrorist crimes against our people, especially those that came on Friday to burn and kill the Dawabsheh family in Nablus, have become from now on wanted by Palestinian security forces. They will be chased through the legal proceedings in order to defend the lives and property of our people,” Damiri said.
General Damiri went on to say that he had no confidence in the Israeli authorities to bring the toddler’s murderers to justice. If they are caught, he suggested in a thinly-veiled threat, the perpetrators will likely “only be imprisoned for a few hours or days.” Damiri finished by calling on Israel, the United States, the United Nations, and the international community to designate Jewish extremist groups as terrorist organizations.
“Even after Jewish colonial settlers attacked a village with Molotov-cocktails, burning to death one-and-half year-old Ali Dawabsheh and severely burning three of his family members, we have not been ordered to cooperate [with security coordination with the Israelis],” Major General Akram Rajoub, governor of Nablus, told The Media Line. “There is no shared committee to investigate what has happened – the Israelis never asked and they ignored our requests in this regard.”
Suggesting that in his experience the Israeli security forces will know exactly who conducted the attack but will not share such information with any PA investigation, Rajoub invoked a political path, laying the blame well beyond those who threw the Molotov Cocktail: “The killer in this crime is not an individual, but the settler bloc – a group of terrorists, mass murderers and thieves of Palestinian land – which enjoys the full support and protection of the Israeli government,” Rajoub said, noting that under terms of the 1993 Oslo Accords, Israel is obligated to provide security for Palestinians living in the region designated “Area C” which is off-limits to the Palestinian security services.
“The attack would not have happened without the insistence of the Israeli government on continuing settlement activities and protecting settlers in the occupied territories,” Ghassan Daglas, chief of Nablus council’s file on settlements, told The Media Line. As a result, the PA has decided to go to the UN Security Council to request the adoption of a resolution condemning settler attacks against Palestinians “and ongoing development of Jewish communities in Palestinian territory,” Daglas said. The crime of the murder of Ali Dawabsheh will be put before the International Criminal Court as part of this move, he added.
In response to the threat of violence from Jewish extremists, groups of unarmed youths have begun volunteering to patrol Palestinian villages at night, Daglas confirmed. People from the villages of Burin, Qasra and Loban, all near Nablus, have initiated local patrols unaffiliated with any government body. In the event of a threat, volunteers will use mosque speakers to warn local residents and simultaneously send a message to the District Coordination Office (DCO) which communicates with the Israeli army.
Such communication used to be a regular occurrence. Mark Prowisor, former security chief for the Israeli community of Shilo, told The Media Line that prior to and during the early days of the second Intifada there were meetings between the security personnel of the Jewish communities and the chief of the Palestinian police, something he says no longer exists. But most of the Israelis interviewed for this article suggested that while collaboration between Israeli and Palestinian security officials continues in many forms as needed, even if Palestinians are unlikely to speak about.
Regarding the current incidents, Israel Police spokeswoman Luba Samri told The Media Line that, “There has been no need until now to cooperate with the Palestinian police [regarding the firebomb on the roadway]. We are cooperating in the case of the Duma attack but the Palestinians will deny it. In the case of the Molotov attack against the Israeli, they don’t need it yet.”
Miri Ovadia, a spokeswoman for Israel’s Binyamin Regional Council, a post-1967 area of Jewish settlement on the West Bank (Samaria to the Israelis), paints a picture more positive than the Palestinian portrayal. She told The Media Line that, “We see normal level coexistence between Israelis and Palestinians in business, in joint construction projects in Jewish communities all over Israel [“joint” meaning Palestinians working in Israeli communities because it’s illegal for Israelis to work in the Palestinian territories.] Yet, she says there are many frequent attempts by Palestinians to harm Israelis on the roads.
For the past five years the PA has been complaining to the Israeli and American governments about the increasingly dangerous attacks by Jewish extremists in the West Bank, Daglas said, but claims the PA is powerless to prevent such crimes because they are not able to arrest Israeli citizens according to the Oslo Accords and placing CCTV cameras to watch for threats from Jewish communities is not permitted by the Israeli Army.
Spokesperson Ovadia, meanwhile, added that if she knew who the assailants of the Dawabsheh family were, “of course I would hand them over.”
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