Yerushalayim Police Prepare Ahead of Last Friday of Ramadan

Yerushalayim police officers were preparing Wednesday ahead of this coming Friday’s prayers at the Al-Aqsa mosque, at the conclusion of the Muslim month of Ramadan.

Riots have broken out on the site repeatedly over the past month after Palestinians collected rocks and other material to use against police forces and mispallelim at the Kosel.

Earlier this month, Israeli forces broke into the mosque and arrested hundreds of rioters, mostly residents of East Yerushalayim and some from Yehudah and Shomron or Arab communities in Israel.

Senior officials at the Public Security Ministry and the Shin Bet were not prepared for the violence and said they lacked sufficient intelligence on preparations made in advance by the rioters.

“Police were forced to operate in the dark,” one official said, “and could only react to events unfolding.”

Speaking to Yediot, the officials said that the police identified the Israeli-Arab area of Wadi Ara, in northern Israel, as a source of some of the extreme rioters who were inciting others on social media. Still, they said no intelligence was available ahead of time as to the role Israeli citizens would play in the riots.

The lack of intelligence was identified during the May 2021 riots in mixed Jewish and Arab cities. The police at the time was unprepared and only after three days was able to muster the manpower needed to contain them.

Some personnel were summoned from the forces’ reserve units and others were transferred from other hotspots in efforts to prevent a more dangerous outburst of violent clashes.

The responsibility, though, is on the Shin Bet to obtain intelligence and they are seen by the officials as uninformed when it comes to Arab Israelis.

The police took upon themselves to establish an intelligence unit that will coordinate with all other security agencies, which has thus far succeeded in foiling attacks and has identified numerous inciters on social media.

“The Shin Bet understands it must up its game when it comes to intelligence gathering, so that the police, as well as other agencies, would be able to act, conduct preventive detentions, break up harmful groups and remove inciteful content from the web.”

This week is the last Friday of Ramadan and will be a test of the advanced intelligence the force will have, as violent clashes are expected.

In preparation, troop deployment has been increased in Yerushalayim.

The Shin Bet said in response that it is working in full cooperation with the police to end the violence on Har HaBayis.

The intelligence provided by the agency has contributed to the arrest of many and the prevention of violence. The Shin Bet will continue to cooperate with its partners in order to protect Israelis.