I see it more this way:
IDF Predicts: War After Gaza Pullout
17:09 Apr 17, '05 / 8 Nisan 5765
The Palestinian terror onslaught offensive is expected to resume in September, prompting the IDF's re-capture of cities in Judea and Samaria in the fall, and a re-entry to Gaza by early next year.
The IDF has given the code-name "Rainy Day" to the period following the disengagement/expulsion, which is scheduled to begin July 20 and end sometime in August. This name was chosen "not only because of the autumn winds soon to blow," writes military correspondent Haggai Huberman in HaTzofeh, "but also because of the military scenario foreseen by the army. "The army is calling it a 'security escalation' - in other words, a renewal of war with the Palestinians."
The violence is expected to reach such levels, Huberman writes, that "the IDF will be forced to re-take the cities of Judea and Samaria" that were recently given over to the security control of the Palestinian Authority. Jericho and Tul Karem were recently given over, but the handover of Kalkilye to the PA has been held up because the PA refuses to collect the weapons of wanted terrorists.
"The mind-boggling thing," Huberman continues, "is that the State of Israel is advancing, knowingly and with its eyes open, towards this death trap. The Yom Kippur War of October 1973 was a surprise, but the war of October 2005 is totally known in advance. Senior IDF officers say it in closed sessions in the clearest manner possible to everyone, including the media. The Prime Minister and the Defense Minister, pushing with all their might for the uprooting [of the Jews in Gaza and northern Shomron], also know it. This scenario is shown on slides that the senior officers show the diplomatic echelons, the government, the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, and all others who have to know."
Haaretz defense affairs expert Amir Oren agrees. "In and around the IDF," Oren writes today, "the assessments are mixed as to how well the security forces will overcome the [Jewish] opponents of the evacuation... But there is no disagreement about what can be expected after the summer: The prediction is that by next January to March, after Palestinian terror has increased and become more sophisticated, the IDF will return to Gaza - this time without the police."
HaTzofeh's Huberman adds that even if a diplomatic agreement appears to be in the making, terrorism will still be renewed - but on a "more moderate" level. "These, then, are the two only post-expulsion possibilities the IDF is preparing for," he writes: "If there is an agreement, there will be terrorism, and if there is no agreement, there will be an escalation, i.e., war."
Arms-smuggling from Egypt into Gaza, and from there to Judea and Samaria, or along the Egypt-Negev-Judea route, continues to increase. Standardized powerful dynamite, which has not been seen in Judea and Samaria since Operation Defensive Shield almost three years ago, is among the materials the terrorists are trying to smuggle in. IDF officials consider this the main threat against Israel today, as it will mean roadside bombs along major highways in the Israeli heartland.
In the 15 weeks of the year 2005 , the army reports that 1,000 rifles have been smuggled from Sinai into Gaza and the Negev. Dozens of RPG mortar launchers, 150 pistols and tens of thousands of bullets have found their way into Israel since the beginning of the year. Some 600 rifles were smuggled in over the past month alone. It is suspected as well that five anti-aircraft shoulder missiles were smuggled in via one of the tunnels into Gaza. |
