National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir is pushing for a Defensive Shield 2 operation in east Jerusalem as the security cabinet is set to meet Sunday to discuss measures to prevent further terror attacks such as the one that claimed three lives at a Jerusalem bus stop on Friday afternoon.
Ben-Gvir has already spoken with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and asked him to call up reserve Border Police units and to move others from the West Bank into the Palestinian neighborhoods of east Jerusalem.
He has named the pending east Jerusalem operation after the IDF’s West Bank Defensive Shield mission of 2002.
Ben-Gvir wants to move forward with the operation whether or not he receives additional forces and has pushed back at those connected to Netanyahu, who has said that he has no authority to do this.
Ben-Gvir retorted to those close to him, “I certainly have the authority. The intention of a Protective Shield 2 operation is not to release tanks into the streets and targeted areas, but to start enforcing the law.”
Ben-Gvir, according to those close to him, has instructed Police Commissioner Kobi Shabtai and Police Jerusalem District, Doron Turgeman to take steps to protect the public against further Palestinian attacks including the detention and arrest of 150 terror suspects already known to the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) and to increase enforcement in east Jerusalem neighborhoods.
Police will continue to demolish illegal Palestinian buildings in east Jerusalem, sources close to Ben-Gvir said.
The rented home of Hossein Karaka, a 31-year-old, who carried out the bus stop attack will be sealed, barriers will be placed in east Jerusalem neighborhoods and the arrests of those suspected of incitement will be accelerated the sources said.
Ben-Gvir also expects to ask the cabinet to approve the sealing off of the east Jerusalem neighborhood Isawiya.
"A hotbed of terrorism"
“East Jerusalem has become an ex-territory in the heart of the State of Israel, and a hotbed of terrorism and enormous crime: this includes nationalist and civil crime as well as wild incitement in mosques and in educational materials,” a source close to Ben-Gvir said.
The source explained that Hamas and the Palestinian Authority and Hamas have their tentacles in the eastern part of the city and that this infrastructure must be rooted out.
According to Kan News, Shabtai and Turgeman have not supported Ben Gvir’s call for Operation Defensive Shield 2 out of concern that it would inflame the situation rather than decrease tension. Separately, Ben-Gvir has also called for legislation that would allow for the death penalty to be imposed on terrorists.