By Robert Inlakesh

Israel’s Operation Iron Wall targets Jenin resistance fighters, with direct coordination and complicity from the Palestinian Authority.

On Tuesday, Israel launched a major invasion of Jenin and declared Operation Iron Wall, designed to crush the anti-occupation armed groups in the northern West Bank. However, it is not acting alone and is conducting this major assault with the full complicity of the Palestinian Authority security forces as their proxy. 

Days prior to the announcement that a Gaza-Israel ceasefire had been reached, on January 14, Israel launched three drone strikes in the Jenin Camp, killing six and injuring around a dozen others. This came on the same day that the Palestinian Authority (PA) and Jenin Brigades resistance group reached an agreement to end the 40-day-long PA siege on the refugee camp.

Despite the deal between the two sides, the PA refused to honor its side of the bargain and continued to besiege Jenin Camp and arrest anti-occupation fighters. 

On January 21, only two days after the implementation of the Gaza ceasefire, the occupation forces announced the beginning of a major operation in the northern West Bank. On Wednesday, Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz named the operation “Iron Wall” and vowed to implement the lessons learned “from the method of repeated raids in Gaza”.

The first primary target has been the Palestinian resistance groups operating in Jenin and its refugee camp. Israel has deployed military bulldozers, jeeps, armored personnel carriers, attack helicopters, predator drones, and a large sum of soldiers to wage its offensive. 

Yet, for the first time ever, the PA’s security forces are actively participating in aiding the Israeli crackdown directly. The PA continues its siege surrounding the Jenin refugee camp, arrests resistance fighters who are confronting the Israeli invading army, and maintains close “security coordination” with the occupying force.

During its own crackdown on the anti-occupation resistance groups, the PA’s forces murdered Palestinian civilians, including children and a female journalist. The PA also cut off electricity and water from the Jenin Camp, imposed curfews, fired indiscriminately at those who had tried to simply exit their homes at the wrong time, and was even accused by UN officials of temporarily taking over a hospital and using it as a military facility.

PA officials claim that they are acting against outlaws and on behalf of the Palestinian people as cheap propaganda, but the reality is that the overwhelming majority of the people in the West Bank are against their war crimes. Instead, the deeply unpopular anti-Democratic PA is largely seen as a proxy force of the Israeli occupation at this point. 

Although in the past it had legitimacy, it no longer presents itself as much more than a South Lebanon Army-styled organization, which also provides employment to a large portion of the West Bank population, making it more effective than a traditional occupation proxy.

After the PA failed to involve itself successfully in the Gaza ceasefire deal and is still refusing to commit to a compromise that would permit it to take control of the territory, it appears to be trying to desperately prove its relevance to Israel.

With Donald Trump taking office and immediately rescinding Joe Biden’s executive orders that sanctioned key Israeli settler extremists in the West Bank, the territory seems to be nearing paroxysm. 

The Trump campaign was additionally financed by Israel’s richest billionaire, Miriam Adelson, who pumped a whopping $100 million into his successful bid for Presidency, making it clear that her primary demand was that Washington permit Tel Aviv’s annexation of the West Bank.

The Israeli settler militias who have not only been trained, armed and even integrated into specialized army units like the Desert Frontier over the past years, eye a war on Palestinian villages. These kinds of pogroms are carried out with no opposition from the PA security forces that have refused to step in and help protect their own people, instead repeatedly helping settlers to safety when they enter Israeli-designated PA areas.

Israel is now licking its wounds from seemingly extracting nothing from its 15-month genocide in Gaza, as it failed to achieve its two primary stated goals – crushing Hamas and returning their captives by force – the PA was perhaps dealt an even greater blow. 

Although Israel used its full military might against the Gaza Strip, it has now agreed to withdraw and will have no military presence nor settlements in the territory. This result is due to Gaza’s resistance factions, including Fatah-aligned factions.

Meanwhile, the Fatah-led PA has for two decades – following the Second Intifada – rejected the use of any force against their occupier under all circumstances. The Palestinian Authority security forces, which during the Second Intifada had actually helped fight against Israel, have been turned into a force that is dedicated to preventing any harm to Israeli settler security. 

The PA, instead of taking measures to prevent the expansion of illegal settlements, Israeli ethnic cleansing of Palestinian villages, and annexation of its territory, now fights solely against Palestinians who dare to resist Israel’s actions. This has even begun triggering resignations within the PA, particularly its security forces.

The PA’s model of maximum collaboration with Israel and zero tolerance for resistance, has led them to a position where they now face the loss of the majority of the West Bank. On the other side, Gaza endured one of the greatest atrocities witnessed since World War 2 but still managed to keep ahold of their territory.

The Ramallah-based Authority is therefore seeking to spread the narrative that Gaza’s resistance was useless and that it was dealt a huge defeat and for selfish reasons, while it is the true representative of the Palestinian people that keeps its people’s interests at heart. 

This narrative is false on a number of levels, including the idea that the PA speaks for the vast majority of Palestinians – something that all authoritative polling data disproves. Perhaps the most important aspect of tackling this portrayal of events is in the rampant PA corruption and the collapse of its anti-resistance philosophy, in the face of an occupier that cares little for what it says.

As the Israeli occupation forces intensify their assault on the West Bank, the PA will eventually be forced into the position whereby it becomes a resistance movement again, disbands itself or is deposed. 

It has simply lost its usefulness to anyone, as the Israelis themselves are struggling to see it as a capable partner, especially after its embarrassing failure to successfully defeat the Jenin Brigades after over 40 days of fighting.

(The Palestine Chronicle)

– Robert Inlakesh is a journalist, writer, and documentary filmmaker. He focuses on the Middle East, specializing in Palestine. He contributed this article to The Palestine Chronicle.