Gallant: IDF ‘mowing the lawn’ in West Bank, but will need to ‘pull out the roots’
Defense minister details major crackdown aimed at tackling rise of terror; says all terror operatives must be eliminated or, if they surrender, arrested
Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said on Wednesday that the military has been “mowing the lawn” during an ongoing major operation against terror groups in the West Bank, but will eventually need to “pull out the roots.”
The operation — internally dubbed “Summer Camps” by the army — began on August 28 with simultaneous raids on Jenin, Tulkarem and the Far’a camp near Tubas, with the goal of dismantling Iran-backed Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror networks in the three areas of the northern West Bank.
Following an assessment in the West Bank with senior IDF officers, Gallant said that “the rise of terror in Judea and Samaria is an issue that we need to be focused on at every moment.” He was calling the West Bank by its biblical name.
“The process is an attack to prevent terror. We are mowing the lawn, [but] the moment will also come when we will pull out the roots, that must be done,” he said.
“The rise [in terror] that comes in the form of car bombs and shooting everywhere, these are things that need to be put to an end,” he added.
“These terror organizations that call themselves by all kinds of names, in Nur Shams, or Tulkarm, or Far’a, or Jenin — they [the terror groups] should be wiped out. Every such terrorist should be eliminated, [or] if they surrender, arrest them. There is no other option, use all the forces, everyone who is needed, with full strength.”
The defense minister said he had ordered the military to carry out airstrikes “wherever necessary” in order to “avoid endangering soldiers.”
So far, according to the IDF, more than 30 gunmen have been killed in the operation, among them the head of Hamas in Jenin and the head of Islamic Jihad in the Tulkarem area.
The raid in Far’a has since concluded, but troops have pressed on with operations in Jenin, a known terror hub. The IDF also relaunched operations in Tulkarem, after leaving the city for several days.
On Wednesday, the IDF released footage of it demolishing a bomb-making lab in Tulkarem amid an ongoing operation there.
Another clip released by the military shows an explosive device planted under a road in Tulkarem being neutralized by troops.
The IDF said it also located a bomb hidden in a baby carriage in the area.
On Wednesday, an AFP journalist in Jenin reported seeing empty streets, with residents leaving their homes only to purchase necessities.
The streets were strewn with the rubble of overturned asphalt as armored military vehicles rumbled past.
Jenin and its adjacent refugee camp — where army bulldozers destroyed infrastructure — have long been strongholds of Palestinian terror groups.
The IDF has said it is working to uncover explosive devices planted under the roads, while also allowing municipal workers to repair the damaged infrastructure.
Violence in the West Bank has surged in the past year, following the October 7, Hamas terror onslaught in southern Israel, in which some 1,200 people were massacred and 251 were taken hostage.
Since that date, Israeli troops have arrested some 5,000 wanted Palestinians across the West Bank, including more than 2,000 affiliated with Hamas.
According to the Palestinian Authority health ministry, more than 670 West Bank Palestinians have been killed in that time. The IDF says the vast majority of them were gunmen killed in exchanges of fire, rioters who clashed with troops or terrorists carrying out attacks.
During the same period, 29 people, including Israeli security personnel, have been killed in terror attacks in Israel and the West Bank. Another six members of the security forces have been killed in clashes with terror operatives in the West Bank.
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