by Zvika Fogel
The search for a less
intimidating name for terrorism has become all the rage lately. It
started with the term "low-intensity conflict," meant to differentiate
the war on terror from a full-scale war with an organized enemy's army,
and has recently settled on the term the "battle between the wars."
Is there anyone out
there who believes the soldiers on the ground -- those whose mission it
is to storm terrorists -- care about the euphemisms used by politicians
and generals? Field commanders and the troops on the ground know exactly
what it is -- a war for the very future of the State of Israel.
According to reports
made public by the Shin Bet security agency, the past year has seen more
than 100 terror attacks a month in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria. Not
attempted attacks or intended attacks, but actual terror attacks, which
included planting explosives, the use of Molotov cocktails, and
shooting and stabbing attacks.
The operations and
intelligence efforts security forces pursue are neither a "low-intensity
conflict" nor a "battle between wars." It is a daily battle against an
enemy that is trying to destroy us, and it has a name -- it is called a
struggle for survival.
The recent operation in
Jenin, like the interception of the arms shipment at sea, thousands of
miles from Israel's shores, and the various airstrikes in Sudan and
Syrian that foreign media sources have attributed to Israel, are acts of
war perpetrated in self-defense.
The Iranian and Syrian
weapons bound for radical terror groups like Hamas, Islamic Jihad and
al-Qaida are not meant to rust away on a shelf somewhere -- they are
meant to inflict harm on Israel, to strike the greater Tel Aviv area,
the Gaza Strip border communities, and the Israeli communities adjacent
to the northern border.
The terror groups
fostered by the Palestinian Authority are hardly dovish. They spend
their time recruiting suicide bombers and collecting intelligence with
aim of abducting and killing Israelis. These individuals are not armed
with good intentions, but with guns and rockets launchers.
The only thing we can
do to prevent a terror attack from hitting close to home is to target
our enemies in their beds. That is the essence of defense. Those who
wish to avoid the dubious pleasure of having a rocket explode in their
backyard or a Palestinian suicide bomber explode on their street would
do better to support and encourage those who tirelessly work to keep
such threats at bay.
Those who speak of
peace would do better to listen to the words of Hamas Prime Minister in
Gaza Ismail Haniyeh, who, while speaking at a rally honoring Hamas
co-founder Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, vowed to "make Tel Aviv quiver." If he
truly means that, then I must ask: Are we going to sit around and let it
happen?
Brig. Gen. (res.) Zvika Fogel is a former chief of staff of the IDF Southern Command.
Source: http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_opinion.php?id=7817
Copyright - Original materials copyright (c) by the authors.
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