Sunday, October 19, 2003, at 7:10pm Israel time, four Israeli soldiers were ambushed while on a routine patrol in the Arab village of Ein Yabrud, a village which abuts the northern part of Ramallah and is separated from the Jewish settlement of Ofra by a single road. The Israelis were shot at by three or perhaps four men armed with AK-47s and M-16s. All four were hit. The lead soldier was propelled into the nearby shrubbery by the force of the shot where he lay, wounded. The other three, felled on the road they had been patrolling, were approached by their attackers who proceeded to riddle their bodies with automatic fire. The attackers left the scene in a red Fiat Uno.
The sole surviving Israeli soldier was raced to Jerusalem’s Hadassah Hospital where he underwent nearly twelve hours of surgery.
Responsibility for the act was claimed by two terrorist organizations, the Islamic Fundamentalist Hamas and the Fatah’s Al Aksa Brigade, a group directly accountable to Palestinian President Yasser Arafat. Looking at intelligence reports and analyzing the style of the attack – soldiers attacked by gunmen rather than suicide bombers – it seems that this was, indeed, the work of an Al Aksa unit with contacts to Hezbullah.
For as long as I have been writing this column I have maintained that the most despicable dimension of terror is that it targets the defenseless and the innocent. What happened to these four soldiers was tragic, it was senseless, but it was not an act of terror. It was a well planned and executed military operation against a defensible military target.
Israelis and Palestinians are at war. And according to the rules of war, these Israelis were a legitimate target. They were military. They were armed. They were in Ein Yabrud searching out exactly those people who surprised them, ambushed them, shot them.
Deliberately targeting innocents is not war, that is terror. Hitting military personnel on patrol is attacking a legitimate target. I know it. The Israeli military knows it. The Palestinians know it.
One of the first rules of military leadership and command is to ensure the safety of your troops. To do that, never be predictable. Never go the same way and never at the same times. Vary every action. On Sunday, that elementary rule of military survival was ignored. This patrol was regular in its path and in its timing. Four soldiers paid the price. It was an easy “lay and wait” ambush.
According to Avi Solomon, the bereaved father of Roi Yaacov Solomon, one of the three dead soldiers, the Israeli military played a game of roulette with his son’s life. The father is quoted as saying that “all they were missing was flares, dress whites and a drummer” to announce their presence on patrol. He has asked for a meeting with the defense minister to examine the circumstances of his son’s death.
For the Palestinians this was a major success. For the Israelis, it was a colossal military operational snafu.
The Arab world also sees a distinction between attacks on soldiers and attacks on Israeli civilians. A close look at Arab media makes this clear.
After a suicide bombing the press covers celebrations honoring the success of the bomber and showering accolades on the new martyr and the martyr’s family. But this pales when it comes to coverage after a successful attack against the Israeli military. Those are real victories. Mano a mano, not mano against children or elderly grandparents.
When brave, innovative Palestinians blow up and destroy an Israeli tank or enter an Israeli outpost killing soldiers, taking their weapons and escaping without a trace and without injury that’s a tremendous publicity victory. Congratulations and adulations reverberate throughout the Arab world. It is a huge strike for Arab honor – much more so than the successes of male or even female suicide bombers.
What I am saying might not be popular with either Israelis or with Palestinians. But it is an honest assessment of the situation. And it holds a valuable lesson for the United States in Iraq. All military personnel and sites are legitimate targets. They must act accordingly.
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Micah Halpern is the author of “What You Need to Know About: Terror”, published by The Toby Press. Mr. Halpern is an Adjunct Senior Analyst with The Media Line Ltd.