IDF Chief of Staff Lt.-Gen. Eyal Zamir on Thursday announced that he is expanding the IDF forces being used to maintain public order in Judea and Samaria leading into the upcoming fall Jewish holidays.
The Jerusalem Post understands that the volume of forces will be more than double the pre-October 7 force size of around 11 battalions, which at times has grown to 15-20 battalions, but will temporarily grow even more.
Zamir warned the government that Jewish extremist violence has run out of control and that greater backing is needed from the government, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and others actively restraining political officials from provocative actions.
Religious Zionist MK Zvi Sukkot entered the West Bank village of Madama near Nablus on Tuesday during an IDF-escorted tour and participated in destroying a monument that appeared to honor members of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades and Palestinians killed during the intifada.
According to the IDF, Sukkot requested military protection for what he told them would be an innocent tour of monuments. Soldiers were diverted from serious operational duties to provide security. The IDF stated that Sukkot double-crossed them and destroyed the monument without authorization, leading to a global uproar and condemnation of Israel for state-sanctioned destruction of monuments.
Arrests of Jewish extremists reach new lows under Ben-Gvir
All of this takes place as IDF officials have said Jewish extremist violence has reached new levels, with hundreds of extremists recently drawing out a conflict with the IDF at the Palestinian village of Kusra for nearly a week.
It also takes place as IDF and Shin Bet officials say that the police, after three years under Itamar Ben-Gvir, have reached highly problematic lows in terms of arresting and helping indict Jewish extremists in the West Bank.
None or almost none (the police have been at a low also in terms of transparency) of those involved in the Kusra actions were arrested.
Accordingly, Zamir has brought in the Golani Brigade and the Paratroopers Brigade to supplement the standard forces in the area, some of which have appeared too sympathetic to Jewish extremists attacking Palestinian villages.
However, without more backing from the government, Zamir warned that even increased IDF forces will be insufficient.
Deploying elite forces in West Bank at cost of Northern, Southern border defenses
Further, the IDF chief noted that moving more elite forces into Judea and Samaria risks leaving the more dangerous northern and southern borders less defended, and also will mean fewer soldiers get off for the upcoming holidays.
Regarding the holidays, Zamir in general has reduced how many days off soldiers receive since he took office in March 2025.
One of the failures of October 7, 2023, was that half of the soldiers meant to be on duty in Gaza were off for the Simchat Torah holiday.
In the same statement, Zamir blasted the Finance Ministry for what he said were politicized and unnecessary fights over budget and side financial issues.
An IDF spokesperson said that there were three debates going on between the IDF and the ministry.
The first is that the IDF said that the ministry was due to have transferred NIS 15 billion weeks ago as part of a prior deal and that the funding has been delayed.
Second, another NIS 25 billion is due to be transferred imminently, but now the IDF is worried that this funding will be delayed like the earlier NIS 15 billion.
Third, the sides are stuck not only on funding, which nominally was already agreed to, but on future multi-year funding negotiation issues.
Currently, estimates have the IDF defense budget up to NIS 160 billion per year, around double what it was pre-October 7.
An IDF spokesperson clarified that the NIS 40 billion under debate is part of the already-agreed NIS 160 billion number, and not related to new funding requests.
The ministry responded that the IDF should be more judicious in spending its ballooning budget.
In the past, the ministry has also accused the IDF of a mix of waste, a lack of carefulness in certain areas of spending, and some areas of unpoliced fraud.
The IDF in the past has acknowledged some errors in these areas, but mostly said that three nearly constant years of war have meant that its expanded budget cannot be viewed based on past budgets, but only based on the number of fronts Israel has constantly had to fight or be ready to fight on.