The same week the Palestinian Authority doubled the salary of Hamas member Hussam Kawasme, who is in prison for planning the abduction and murder of three Jewish teens in Gush Etzion in the summer of 2014 – as revealed by Palestinian Media Watch – IDF soldier Dvir Sorek, 18, was murdered in the same area. Sorek's murder took place exactly five years after the kidnapping that shook the entire nation, and now authorities are looking into whether Hamas in Gaza and its "terrorism headquarters" were involved in this latest incident, at least tangentially.
For now, there are no proven links between Hamas in Gaza and the two suspects arrested for Sorek's murder, Hamas operative Nazir Saleh Khalil and his cousin, Qasem Araf Khalil, both from the Atafra clan.
Follow Israel Hayom on Facebook and Twitter
According to the Shin Bet security agency, two other Atafra clan members, Yazan and Saif, were recruited at the behest of Hamas in Gaza by Awis Rajoub to carry out a terrorist attack at a shopping mall, on a bus, or on a train. They were supposed to pick their target and prepare the explosives that were to be used. Rajoub was being handled from Gaza. He maintained contact with his handlers using a telephone that he picked up at a pharmaceutical warehouse in Ramallah. The phone's password was sewn into a pair of pants that he was given by an elderly woman from Gaza who was allowed into Israel to receive medical treatment. The Shin Bet says that Hamas in Gaza and its branch in Judea and Samaria, which is made up almost entirely of terrorists released in the deal to free captive soldier Gilad Schalit and which played a part in the kidnapping of the three teens in 2014, never stops trying to execute terrorist attacks in Judea and Samaria and within the Green Line. Its activity is directed not only from Gaza, but also from Lebanon, Turkey, and Qatar, and in the past few months, Iranian money has also entered the picture. Last week's events on the Temple Mount, in which Hamas was also involved, provide the organization with an opportunity to set dozens of potential terrorists and terrorist attacks in motion.
In the past few weeks alone, the Shin Bet exposed a number of Hamas cells that have been planning abductions, shootings, and stabbings, like the one that claimed the life of Sorek, under orders from Gaza. They were also plotting against the PA itself.
A large, ready-to-use bomb was discovered in recent weeks in the possession of Tamer Rajah Rajbi, a 22-year-old student from the Palestine Polytechnic University in Hebron, and was manufactured in Gaza by Ramzi Alouk, originally from the Aida refugee camp near Bethlehem, who was deported to the Gaza Strip, and another member of Hamas' military wing, the Izzedine al-Qassam Brigade, Ahmed Katari from Jabaliya.
The bomb was covered with metal nails, nuts and bolts to increase the shrapnel and scope of harm that would be caused when it was detonated. Rajbi's handlers in Gaza – Hamas engineers, some of whom had been freed in the Schalit deal – instructed him via Whatsapp on how to build bombs. He was also directed to certain shops in Hebron to acquire the necessary components.
Hamas' West Bank operation does not limit itself to taking remote orders. Recently, it has tried to send its own explosives expert into Israel to build bombs here. The Shin Bet has named the man as Fadi Abu al-Sabah, 35, from the town of Nuseirat in Gaza. Al-Sabah, like the old woman who passed on the phone code to the two terrorists from the Atafra clan, had been granted a humanitarian permit to receive medical treatment in Israel, which is how he entered the country. He was prepared for his role in a series of meetings held in the home of another operative who was also freed from prison in exchange for Schalit who was recruited by Ashraf Sabah, who served 12 years in prison for involvement in various terrorist attacks.
Before al-Sabah departed Gaza for medical treatment, Sabah gave him a jacket in which he had folded a piece of cloth containing code words for contact between Hamas in Gaza and its recruits in the West Bank. That is how he was supposed to keep in contact with his handlers in Gaza about carrying out a terrorist attack against Israeli targets. Luckily, security forces at the Erez Crossing confiscated the jacket and the piece of cloth.
Another Gaza-based director of attacks recently unmasked by the Shin Bet is Nur al-Din, who tried to recruit potential suicide bombers among the residents of the Urif village in Samaria as well as villages near Tulkarem and Hebron.
The fingerprints of Hamas' West Bank "office" are also all over the process of recruitment in Judea and Samaria. Recently, it came to light that it was using the Al-Aqsa satellite network to recruit terrorists. The network, which operated out of Gaza, was later bombed by the Israeli Air Force in November 2018.
When one, Kutaiba al-Nawaja'a, 21, from the village of Yatta, found it difficult to believe that he was talking with a Hamas operative from Gaza on Facebook. The latter asked him to select a verse from the Quran and was told to watch Al-Aqsa the next day when the verse would be inserted into the broadcasts.
The verse indeed appeared, and he was convinced that he was really in contact with Hamas in Gaza. He was ordered to carry out a suicide bombing on a bus in the Israeli city of Lod. He was arrested a few days before he was supposed to have been given an explosive belt.
3 districts
The activity of the Hamas headquarters in Judea and Samaria is well-ordered and structured. Until a few years ago, it was led from Turkey and Qatar by Saleh al-Arouri, who is now deputy head of Hamas' politburo. Al-Arouri was released from Israeli prison in 2007 on the condition that he leave Israel, and security officials see him as a major problem. Today, he has formed ties with Hezbollah and Iran in the Dahieh neighborhood of Beirut, and he has been succeeded in the West Bank by Maher Obeid, who is also believed to be living in Beirut.
Obeid, whose family roots are in Jordan, was raised in Hebron. He was one of the Hamas members deported to Lebanon and has served in a number of roles in the organization. In recent years, he traveled to Tehran with Ismail Haniyeh and al-Arouri to formalize Hamas' ties with Iran and take care to ensure continued financial support for Hamas.
The West Bank headquarters that he currently heads operates out of four different locations: Beirut, Doha, Istanbul, and Gaza. The headquarters oversees three separate districts, each of which has been assigned to terrorists freed in the Schalit deal who were deported to Gaza but are still very familiar with the West Bank. These three and their subordinates are trying to direct the headquarters' activities based on their intimate knowledge of the territory and its residents, and with help from relatives in their various districts.
The southern section of the West Bank, where Sorek was murdered two weeks ago, is the responsibility of Abdel Rahman Ranimat, the former head of the Zurif terrorist cell, which carried out numerous attacks. The Zurif cell kidnapped and killed IDF soldier Sharon Edri and also carried out the suicide bombing at the Apropo café in Tel Aviv in 1997. Three women were killed and 48 people were injured in that attack. According to reports, Ranimat was also involved in the abduction of the three teens in 2014.
The central part of the West Bank is in the charge of Abdallah Arar. He was involved in the abduction of Sasson Nuriel in 2005. Arar was only recently exposed as being involved in attempts to set up a Hamas cell by recruiting residents of two villages to carry out terrorist attacks in the Binyamin region. He even provided them with the money.
Fursan Khalifa, a resident of Tulkarem who was sentenced to 24 years in prison for terrorist activity, oversees the northern section of the West Bank. Like his counterparts, he was freed in the deal to release Schalit and deported to Gaza. Khalifa is suspected of handling Ahmad Jarrar from Jenin, whose cell murdered Rabbi Raziel Shevach near Havat Gilad in Samaria.
Hamas in the West Bank has tried to topple the PA government and even harm PA President Mahmoud Abbas. Israel has discovered at least two such plots, one of which saw the arrest of 92 operatives in a major network that stretched across the West Bank that was planning a coup. Abbas was informed of the plot by then-head of the Shin Bet, Yoram Cohen.
Al-Aqsa as an engine for attacks
Last week, Hamas turned out to be deeply involved in organizing the riots on the Temple Mount. Like in the past, Islamic actors – who are locked in bitter internecine fights everywhere but on the Temple Mount – worked together to "defend Al-Aqsa." The riots were organized ahead of time with the goal of spoiling visits by Jews on Tisha B'Av.
Hamas had a few partners: the Jordanian Waqf, members of the outlawed Northern Branch of the Islamic Movement, and Hizb ut-Tahrir – the Islamic Liberation Party.
The waqf and the leadership on the ground in east Jerusalem proved again that they were in control of tens of thousands of followers who would do their bidding, and who came to the Temple Mount last Sunday to mark Eid al-Adha (the Muslim Feast of the Sacrifice), which this year coincided with Tisha B'Av. All other mosques in Jerusalem heeded their calls and shut down.
Prayers at Al-Aqsa were postponed by an hour so they could be held right when the compound was opened to Jewish visitors. The crowds of thousands of Muslims gathered at the Mughrabi Gate, where Jews enter the Temple Mount, were also planned in advance, as was Hamas' attempt to leverage the events to increase the willingness of Hamas supporters in east Jerusalem to carry out attacks.
For the zillionth time, Hamas accused Israel and the Jews as "sullying" the Temple Mount, planning to change the status quo there, by occupying it and demolishing the mosques.
"What Israel and the settlers are doing on Al-Aqsa will come back at them like a boomerang," Hamas warned.
Israeli security officials are worried that incitement like that, which has already led to terrorist attacks, will again prove effective and cause lone knife wielders and sleeper cells in Jerusalem and Judea and Samaria to attack Jews. That was one of the reasons why on the second, third, and fourth days of Eid al-Adha, the Temple Mount was closed to Jews. The risk Israel took on Tisha B'Av, which fell on the first day of the Muslim holiday, was unusual, and according to some officials, too risky. It was Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan who decided to open the Mount to Jews on Tisha B'Av.
$25 million a month
Another player that influences what takes place on the Temple Mount and in the West Bank is Iran, which last week defined the events on the Temple Mount as the humiliation of the century. Hamas in Gaza lives off of money from Iran.
Israeli sources are unwilling to provide details, but if we take the Hamas newsletter al-Risalah at face value (translated by Middle East scholar Yoni Ben Menachem), Iranian aid to Hamas is considerable – they supply the organization with rockets and weapons, training and military knowledge, intelligence, development of rockets and tunnels, donations to "resistance" infrastructure, financial support for the Hamas government in Gaza to the tune of $25 million per month, tens of millions of dollars in support for Hamas' armed wing, and regular financial aid to families of shahids (martyrs).
Relations between Shiite Iran and Sunni Hamas have seen ups and downs, but today, given Hamas' international isolation, ties are flourishing. IDF Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories Maj. Gen. Kamil Abu Rokon recently warned about Iranian attempts to "take over the Gaza Strip" on the COGAT Arabic-language Facebook page.
Abu Rokon even quoted top Hamas official Saleh al-Arouri, who said that Hamas is Iran's first line of defense. The Israeli defense and security establishment sees Iran's hand in Hamas' attempts to build up its terrorist infrastructure in Judea and Samaria. Last July, senior Hamas officials met with Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in Tehran and agreed to heighten cooperation. Iran is trying to stick its finger into the Temple Mount pie, both via Hamas and via members of the Northern Branch of the Islamic Movement. For now, Israeli officials say, it is doing so without success.
