Former chief of staff, Shaul Mofaz, spoke this morning (Friday) in “Vint” about the largest military operation that the IDF has launched in Judea and Samaria – Operation Defensive Shield, which he led twenty years ago. Five divisions participated in the operation, 20,000 reservists were recruited, all with the aim of stopping the wave of terrorist attacks that claimed the lives of 105 Israeli civilians and 26 soldiers.
He said, “There was a very big dilemma around launching the operation – because there was no legitimacy. In fact, Arafat planned this whole move, they call it a second intifada, but it was not an intifada it was completely planned. About a year earlier in 1999 we estimated in the IDF that it would break out. This confrontation, we prepared for it, but unfortunately the political echelon did not accept our appreciation. “Then there was the madness of negotiations with the Palestinians, both with the Syrians and with the Lebanese on the exit from Lebanon.”
“Our plans were ready, we also prepared the army in terms of training and equipping, but most importantly – between September 2000 and March 2002 for a year and a half, the IDF came in and out of the Palestinian Authority to stop and thwart – but it was not enough. “We had to take over the territories again, expropriate from the Palestinians their responsibility for security and turn Areas A like Areas B, areas where we can stay until we lower the suicide rate,” he said.
At the time, Israel was negotiating with Arafat, and according to the former chief of staff, this was what led to a political ‘euphoria’ that made the government unwilling to launch a large-scale military operation. “The army was not there. We did not engage in the political field, we prepared and at this time of the year and a half until the Defensive Shield the forces operated within Palestinian territory, but we were not allowed to stay there, we would come for short expeditions and leave. This created a reality in which our commanders, our soldiers, the senior command, experienced. This experience we gained over time was as if the positive dimension in the whole process. The negative was the extent of the casualties – tens and hundreds of dead and wounded, “he recalled.
Mofaz recounted what was the moment when it was decided to go into operation: “We sat down on Seder night, March 28, 2002, your faithful servant is sitting in an intercontinental hotel with a thousand people, bereaved families and lone soldiers, and the pagers begin to ring. I get a note: A suicide bomber at the Park Hotel in Netanya has more than 30 dead. What goes through the mind of an Israeli, a Jew, the commander of the army? It is impossible to continue like this, there is no choice. In the tripartite conversation we had that evening between Prime Minister Arik Sharon, the Minister of Defense and myself, the word that was then: ‘There is no choice’ should enter the PA’s territories. “
“Eric asked me what that means, what do you suggest to do immediately? I told him to take over all of Area A. So he says, ‘What does that mean?’ I said to him: ‘It means I need to raise reserves.’ He asks me with such a laugh: ‘Do you know what you have raised already?’ I told him: “Not yet. We will prepare it tonight and tomorrow we will come and confirm it.” Indeed, we recruited an order of 30-40,000 reservists. , He added.
He said, “What surprised us at the Defensive Wall was the extent of this monstrous terrorism within the PA, especially in the refugee camps and cities. Then we exposed, emptied and arrested over 6,000 people. Until these attacks went down. We were not in the market because we fought, our soldiers fought well. “The brigades all fought well. The story is the way Arafat deceived the world. He sits issue and ostensibly lets an agreement be reached but at the same time he orders a weapons ship.”
“On the day we took over the ship (Karin A), which was carrying 50 tons of weapons, the most prominent thing in the ship’s belly were not the mortars, Katyushas, Sager missiles – these were 2.2 tons of TNT designed to give suicide bombers because they had no suicide problem. “Hundreds stood in line. What was missing was explosives. Imagine what would have happened if it had not come,” Mofaz concluded.