IDF Operation Shield and Arrow (IDF)
At around 2 AM local time overnight the IDF opened a new campaign against the leadership and infrastructure of the terrorist organization Islamic Jihad in Gaza called “Operation Shield and Arrow.” The IDF said that it struck a number of sites throughout Gaza used by Islamic Jihad as bases for terrorist activities and killed three senior leaders of the organization. The attacks came a week after Islamic Jihad launched more than 100 rockets from bases in Gaza directed at civilian targets in Israel.
The IDF said it called the operation “Shield and Arrow” because it is an operation of “defense and attack.”
The Three Islamic Jihad leaders the IDF said that it eliminated included Jahed Ahnem, the organization’s military secretary, Tarek Az Adin, the Islamic Jihad’s coordinator of terrorist activities in Judea and Samaria, and Khalil Bahitini, who was described as the commanding officer of the Islamic Jihad in northern Gaza.
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Images seen on Israeli television Tuesday morning showed how the IAf was somehow able to hit only single apartments in specific buildings where the terrorists were located. The IDF credited the Shin Bet, Israel’s ant-terror organization the General Security Services, with providing the intelligence on the locations of the targets.
In addition, the IDF attacked ten sites in Gaza that were described as weapons production facilities and military compounds belonging to the organization. Fighter jets and helicopters from the IAF attacked the sites, which included facilities for the production of rockets located in Khan Yunis, as well as a site that was also used for the production of concrete components used to build terrorist tunnels.
Also, six military compounds belonging to Islamic Jihad were attacked. The IDF reported these targets were used as munitions warehouses and held the logistical infrastructure of the terrorist organization.
IDF spokesman, Brigadier General Daniel Hagari, on the elimination of Islamic Jihad senior officials in the Gaza Strip said, “Tonight, the IDF, together with the Shin Bet, launched a targeted operation against Islamic Jihad senior officials in Gaza. The senior activists were an undermining factor for [Israel’s] security stability.”
Hagari said the IDF actions were taken to “strengthen the residents of the surrounding area and the south,” and added that the IDF “at this stage” achieved its goals and hit “those who needed to be dealt with,” but Israel is also “prepared for any scenario.”
As such, Israel’s security forces are bracing Tuesday for retaliations. Local schools in the region near Gaza are closed and residents have been warned to remain near bomb shelters and to be ready to act at a moment’s notice. However, images from the towns and cities in that region, such as Ashkelon, show people going about their daily routines as usual.
