Free Republic

National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir on Friday afternoon said he had instructed the Commissioner of Israel Police and senior officials in the Jerusalem District to prepare for "Operation Defensive Shield 2 in eastern Jerusalem" starting on Sunday. "The purpose of the operation is to fight and root out terrorism, to reach the terrorists' homes and to stop terrorism before it comes to carry out attacks," said a statement issued by Ben Gvir’s office. The statement, which was published just before the start of Shabbat in Israel, followed the deadly terrorist attack in the Ramot neighborhood of Jerusalem, in which...

The intifada and expanded operations by the IDF and security forces in the West Bank and Gaza Strip caused a substantial increase in direct and indirect defense spending to an estimated NIS 3 billion this year. A planned NIS 2 billion cut in the defense budget was also cancelled. These costs come on top of the NIS 7 billion in defense spending in 2000-01. The IDF spent about NIS 1.5 billion on Operation Defensive Shield in April 2002, in the aftermath of the Passover bombing of the Park Hotel in Netanya. Another NIS 500 million was spent on protective measures...

Sharon says "this stage" of Israeli offensive over   JERUSALEM, April 21 (Reuters) - Prime Minister Ariel Sharon declared an end to "this stage" of Israel's West Bank offensive on Sunday after tanks rumbled out of two more Palestinian cities. The army said it had left Ramallah, apart from Palestinian President Yasser Arafat's compound, and pulled out of Nablus. But it kept up a siege of a Bethlehem church where gunmen are holed up. "We have finished this stage of the operation called Defensive Shield," Sharon told reporters. "We have achieved very profound results but the struggle against terrorism continues. However this time, it will work...