Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said Sunday that Israel would retaliate against anyone who attacks Israelis as the army reinforced the deployment of troops around Gaza and even deployed snipers.
“We will settle the score with anyone who harms our fighters and civilians,” Bennett said at the start of a weekly cabinet meeting and a day after a border police officer was shot and wounded during a riot on the Gaza border.
“During the night, the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) responded with a broad attack in the Gaza Strip. Last week, I conducted a situation assessment in the Gaza Division with Defense Minister Benny Gantz and [IDF] Chief of Staff Aviv Kohavi, and I can tell you that the IDF, the Southern Command and the Gaza Division are prepared and ready for any scenario,” the premier said.
Diaspora Affairs Minister Nachman Shai said that Israel will strike back with force against Gaza but noted that this will not happen during Bennett’s visit to Washington, which is scheduled to start on Tuesday.
“We cannot be lured to their timing (the factions in the Gaza Strip), and we will not allow them to dictate the pace of work,” said Shai in an interview with Radio 103FM in Tel Aviv.
Since Saturday, tensions spiked as thousands of Palestinian demonstrators gathered near borders with Israel to mark the 52nd anniversary of the burning of the Al-Aqsa Mosque by an extremist Israeli.
Israel considered protests, which are the first to happen in months, an attempt by the Hamas movement to express anger at the withholding of the salaries of its government employees from the Qatari grant.
In Israel, many predict that the protest will continue to escalate until these salaries are transferred.
However, several Israeli experts believe that Bennett’s government does not properly read the Palestinian scene in Gaza and is floundering with contradictory decisions.
“Israel failed to correctly read into the directions of the Hamas leader in the Gaza Strip, Yahya Sinwar. It happened in the last battle over the Gaza Strip last May, and it is happening today as well,” said a military affairs correspondent for the Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth.
