A little after 11:30 p.m. yesterday (Sunday), the official date for the ceasefire to take effect, the Islamic Jihad terrorists fired another barrage of rockets, as in previous rounds, to show that they had the last word, this time they were awaited by planes, helicopters and UAVs of The Air Force carried out their own attack, and the fire soon subsided.
The cease-fire, which this time received official approval from Israel in a message from the head of the information system Lior Hayit, was established after a day and a half of talks mediated by Egypt and with the involvement of Hamas leaders. The Egyptians gave Jihad a promise that they would work for the release of two detainees, Bassam al-Saadi and Khalil Awawada. Al Saadi, who was designated as the head of the organization in northern Samaria, was arrested a week ago. It was his arrest that led the jihad to prepare an anti-tank ambush, to close the roads and then to the Israeli attack. Awawda, an administrative detainee who should be released in any case in two months, is on hunger strike and his health is weak. In Egypt’s announcement of the cease-fire it was stated that it would work to release the two. Jihad leader Zeid Nakhla, who was interviewed in Tehran, said that “Brother Khalil Awadeh will be released tomorrow to the hospital and then to his home and Egypt undertakes to work for the release of Sheikh Bassam al-Saadi as soon as possible.”
Prime Minister Yair Lapid summarized the operation and accompanied the ceasefire coming into effect at a meeting of the heads of the defense establishment, Defense Minister Benny Gantz and Alternate Prime Minister Naftali Bennett.
Hamas was left out of the campaign
The summary of the operation shows that the Jihad launched about 550 rockets at Israel, about a third of which fell inside the Gaza Strip and 96% of the rest were intercepted by the Iron Dome or fell in open areas. The damages in Israel are minor, there are about ten lightly and moderately wounded and a number of anxiety victims. The jihad suffered heavy losses under his leadership. About twenty fighters and commanders of the organization were killed, including two brigade commanders. The commander of the northern brigade, Taysir Jabari, was killed in the first seconds of the operation, and the commander of the southern brigade, Khaled Mansour, a day later. Many of the organization’s rocket launchers and warehouses were destroyed, and the morale blow is severe.
The pressure of the members of the organization from inside the strip against the intention of the leadership from outside to continue the fighting finally increased and the organization responded to the Egyptian mediation to stop the fire. Another failure of the organization was the firing of the rockets and not only because of Iron Dome. A third of the rockets fell inside the Strip and caused the death of about 15 people, most of them children and teenagers. Although in the strip they tried to hide things, the street knows and understands this. Another 5 to 8 non-involved civilians were killed in IDF strikes.
Hamas remains out of the game and Israel sees this as an important achievement, both in light of maintaining deterrence against the organization – for economic and other reasons, and due to what seems to be the direction of even a small appointment of Hamas, which opens the way to perhaps a long-term truce – “Hodna”.
The IDF and the security establishment conclude the operation with great satisfaction, both in terms of the quality intelligence that led to the assassination of the top officials in the surprise operation, both in the follow-up attacks and in the functioning of Iron Dome.
Israel emphasizes that the terms of the cease-fire do not limit the IDF from any action, and to illustrate this IDF fighters destroyed during the night in the village of Rumna in the Jenin area the homes of Asad Al-Rafa’i and Subhi Abu Shakir, the two terrorists who carried out the attack in Elad, in which Three people were murdered, Yonatan Habakkuk, Boaz Gol and Oren ben Yiftah.