Why Were Israeli Soldiers in Jenin, Anyway?

A debate is raging over whether Israeli soldiers or Palestinian Arab terrorists were responsible for the shooting death of an Al Jazeera reporter in Jenin. But nobody seems to be asking one important question: Why were Israeli soldiers in Jenin, anyway?

After all, way back in 1995, as part of the Oslo II agreement, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin withdrew all Israeli troops from the areas in Judea-Samaria where 98% of the Palestinian Arabs live, including all major cities such as Jenin.

So, the Israeli troops who were in Jenin last week were not there as part of the old occupying force. They were not there to establish a Jewish settlement. And they were not there to govern the city. Even Raja Abdulrahim, the pro-Palestinian reporter who was recently hired by the Jerusalem bureau of the New York Times, acknowledged in an article last month that “40% of the region is governed by the Palestinian Authority.”

So, if those Israeli soldiers were not in Jenin to govern, or to occupy, or to settle, then what in the world were they doing there? Why don’t they just stay within the Israeli-governed parts of the region? Why venture into PA territory, even for a few hours?

The answer is that the PA’s refusal to fight the terrorists forced the Israelis to go into Jenin and do the job themselves.

The Oslo accords require the PA to disband all terrorist groups, seize their weapons, and outlaw them—that is, to put them out of business.

One can understand the logic behind Prime Minister Rabin’s decision to out-source the fight against terrorism to the PA. After all, the PA security forces know the terrain. They know where the weapons depots and safe houses and training sites are located. And the PA certainly has the ability to do the job—it has one of the largest per-capita security forces in the world.

In short, they could smash the terrorist groups if they wanted to. But they just don’t want to. The PA never outlawed the terrorist groups. It has never made a serious effort to capture its members or seize its weapons, in Jenin or anywhere else. The PA treats the terrorists in Jenin and the other areas under its control like brothers, and allows them to operate freely.

That’s why here we are, 27 years after the PA became the sole ruler in Jenin, and the city is still filled with active terrorist cells from Hamas, Fatah, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad (the gang which murdered my daughter Alisa).

Even the New York Times occasionally admits that terrorists roam free in PA cities. On March 23, 2014, for example, the Times reported that Israeli troops were forced to enter the Jenin refugee camp in pursuit of terrorists because although Jenin is under the “full control” of the PA, “the Palestinian [security forces] did not generally operate in refugee camps.”

Why do the media and the United Nations treat Palestinian Arabs as if they are morally incapable of non-violence?

The PA, by its deliberate inaction, has forced the Israeli army to occasionally enter Jenin in pursuit of terrorists. The alternative would be for the Israelis to just sit back and wait for the terrorists to attack again. Obviously, they can’t do that. They have to chase them. And sometimes that means chasing them into a Palestinian Arab city.

No Israeli commander relishes sending his soldiers into a dangerous, populated area like Jenin. It means endangering the soldiers’ lives. It means the possibility of situations in which bystanders are inadvertently harmed. But the Israelis literally have no choice.

The Palestinian Arabs, however, do have a choice. They don’t have to pick up guns and shoot at the Israeli soldiers. In fact, if the Palestinians were as “moderate” and “peace-seeking” as J Street and the State Department are always telling us, they wouldn’t pick up guns at all—instead, they would cheer when the Israelis arrest terrorists.

Instead, the Palestinians shoot. And notice how the international community and news media treat such shooting—as if it’s perfectly acceptable behavior. When extremists in an American city open fire on police officers, there is unanimous horror. There are calls for stricter enforcement of laws restricting guns.

Why don’t we hear such calls when Palestinian pick up guns? How come nobody talks about “gun control” in Jenin? Why are scenes of Palestinian Arabs firing automatic weapons at Israeli soldiers considered normal and fine?

Or, to put it another way—why do the media and the United Nations treat Palestinian Arabs as if they are morally incapable of non-violence? Why do they act as if Palestinians are inhuman savages who must resort to murder? Those are the questions that I’d like to see asked at the next State Department briefing or J Street press conference.

Stephen M. Flatow, is an attorney and the father of Alisa Flatow, who was murdered in an Iranian-sponsored Palestinian terrorist attack in 1995. He is the author of “A Father’s Story: My Fight for Justice Against Iranian Terrorism.”