Nearly five months in, how has Maj. Gen. Avi Bluth handled Jewish extremism in the West Bank?

The bottom line is that 2024 is a stark failure in restoring security and order as compared to almost every other year in the last decade.

By YONAH JEREMY BOB NOVEMBER 28, 2024 17:35 Updated: NOVEMBER 28, 2024 17:36

NEW OC Central Command Maj.-Gen. Avi Bluth has his work cut out for him dealing with extremist Jewish violence and a rise in Palestinian terrorism. (photo credit: OREN BEN HAKOON/FLASH90)

Closing in on five months into his role as IDF Central Commander, and therefore West Bank commander, is the area safer or less safe than belief Maj. Gen. Avi Bluth took on the job?

There are no clear answers and there is contrary evidence pointing in both directions depending on which anecdotal evidence you focus on and how you measure the impact of outside factors, but Bluth has definitely already put his own stamp on the role.

In judging his success or failure, the analysis – and the Jerusalem Post has checked in with a variety of sources and data on both sides - needs to look at: whether levels of Palestinian terror against Israelis in the West Bank are up or down, whether levels of Jewish extremist violence against Palestinians is up or down, whether the law is being enforced regarding illegal building by either side, and the general feel of whether there is order or not.

In terms of statistics, the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center has reported that there has been no real change in serious Palestinian terror attacks since Bluth took over on July 8 from his predecessor Maj. Gen. (res.) Yehuda Fuchs.

July, Bluth’s first month, saw a jump to 12 such attacks, from eight in May and five in June, followed by 10 in August, six in September and eight again in October. April was actually the worst month of 2024 with 16, but the basic trend has been a large number of serious Palestinian terror attacks – far larger than before the war started in 2023, with neither Fuchs, nor Bluth so far, getting control of the situation.

Screenshot of the incident of settler violence in Qusra from 21 June 2024. (credit: SECTION 27A COPYRIGHT ACT)

Of course, the war is only one way to measure these statistics, especially because violence in the West Bank had spiked already as of March 2022 with several rounds of terror waves.

So looking back to include the 2022 wave of terror, 2022 saw 86 terror attacks and 2023 saw 182, with 2024 being in the middle.

But this is not the way Israelis really want to measure their security as 2022-2023 were viewed as a disaster in terms of the level of terror in Judea and Samaria and far beyond “acceptable very occasional” terror levels.

2022 was itself a spike up to 86 from a mere 34 in 2019, 40 in 2020, and 54 in 2021.

With 98 serious Palestinian terror attacks to date and on pace to get to 105-110 for all of 2024, besides the largest spike in 2023, the last time that serious terror attacks would have broken the 100 level, as in 2024, would be way back in 2016.  

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The bottom line is that 2024 is a stark failure in restoring security and order as compared to almost every other year in the last decade.

And this is the better-looking statistics for the West Bank, as the Shin Bet rates there have been eight serious attacks in September, 26 in August and 27 in July – higher numbers than the Meir Amit Center.

This would not be Bluth and the IDF’s perspective.

They would emphasize statistics that during the current war, the IDF has killed 750 terrorists in the West Bank, where 70% were holding weapons (some could be shot while trying to escape and where arrest is not realistic) with their records indicating only 3% of those killed by the IDF in countless gunfights in urban areas were civilians. This is a huge increase of killing terrorists in the West Bank, while still not killing, in relative terms, a substantial number of civilians.

In addition, Bluth believes that investing more in intelligence collection and in arming the various Jewish villages have improved security in the area.

Further, the Post has learned that their view would be that the biggest trend to watch is the increase in air strikes and larger scale anti-terror operations since Bluth has taken over.

This has meant an increase sometimes in killed versus arrested terrorists, and it has also meant a significant reduction in successes from organized terror groups, especially from Hamas.

Bluth’s view is that any Palestinian terror success needs to be framed not just in terms of there being an increased broad motivation for terror in the West Bank due to the ongoing war, but also due to a specific push by Iran to inflame the West Bank.

According to Tehran, the West Bank is an ideal place to use terror proxies against Israel as it is the hardest for Israel to track for sure back to the Islamic Republic, and it avoids the major losses the ayatollahs have taken on during two head-to-head rounds with Israel in April and October.

Also, Bluth thinks that West Bank Palestinians, both because of Iran and because of the ideology naturally surrounding them, were highly provoked into violent action after Israel managed to kill Hezbollah Chief Hassan Nasrallah.

Further, Bluth is cognizant that anytime there is a successful terror attack, it can lead to a new wave of copycats, and he has prided himself on squelching any attempt to turn one or two attacks into a new wave which a series of sometimes preemptive larger scale and longer IDF raids into the West Bank.

Under Bluth, the Post has learned that the IDF has entered Jenin in larger numbers around six times, the most well-known in the late summer lasting for around 10 days.

According to defense sources, many of the recent terror attacks that have succeeded have been lower-grade attacks, such as single-person rammings, as opposed to more organized multi-armed terrorist shootings.

Moreover, the IDF under Bluth has preempted terror in other situations, such as a case where it killed 14 terrorists in Tulkarem right before Rosh Hashanah who were planning a huge “anniversary-style” terror attack for October 7, 2024.

This attack did not end terror in the West Bank, but the forward leaning moves prevented Hamas and other terror groups from destabilizing the West Bank, such that the military could stay more focused on fighting in Gaza and Lebanon.

Bluth would also note that while much of the IDF’s focus has been on Jenin, Nablus, and Tulkarem in the northern West Bank, there has still been enforcement activity against terror in the southern West Bank as well, including Hebron.

Of course, such a defense of Bluth’s record raises the question of: post-Lebanon ceasefire, will terror in the West Bank dissipate? The same logic that says terror has been harder because of the surrounding conflicts would dictate that with the nearby fighting ending, Judea and Samaria should also become quieter.

Jewish extremist violence

Statistically, the picture which human rights groups presented of Jewish extremist violence is also negative both before and during Bluth’s tenure.

By the way, why refer to the term Palestinian terrorism versus the term Jewish extremist violence?

First of all, there are incidents of Jewish terror where Jews have killed Palestinians in cold blood and in such cases, Jewish terror is the right term.

But as a phenomenon, these cases are very few, and most Jewish extremism problems are issues of vandalizing and burning property and physical beatings, which while clearly criminal and violent, have not led to anywhere near the same number of deaths of Palestinian civilians, as there have been deaths of Jewish civilians.

There are also cases where IDF soldiers have killed Palestinian civilians, but most of these are by mistake, and a bunch which were illegal have led to prosecutions.

In any case, according to the International Crisis Group, there have been 1,289 incidents of Jewish extremists (not soldiers) attacking Palestinians or their property since October 7, 2023, leading to 378 injuries and 16 fatalities.

In comparison, in 2021 the numbers were at 400 such incidents, with the number much lower going back to 2016.

Likewise, injuries in 2021 were closer to 100 with the numbers going back to 2016 being almost zero some years, and fatalities ranging much lower between zero and five.

These statistics are not that hard to understand, given there have been three mass Jewish violent attacks on Palestinian villages between February 2023-August 2024.

The first two were in 2023 against Huwara and Turmus Aya were under Fuchs, but the most recent one in Jit on August 15 came on Bluth’s watch.

Around 100 Jewish extremists entered the northern West Bank village of Jit, firing bullets and tear gas and torching cars and homes, killing a Palestinian and injuring several others.

This would have been bad enough if it was the first such incident, but given the earlier two incidents, it is difficult to see how the IDF, under Bluth, allowed this to happen.

If 100 Palestinians marched on a Jewish West Bank settlement, the IDF would probably flood the area with troops and drones for months or years to make sure it would be literally impossible for this to happen again.

While there are plenty of excuses and finger-pointing between the IDF and other security services, the bottom-line is that neither the IDF nor Bluth had enough troops or drones in the area to stop such a large convoy of Jewish extremists until they had already done significant violence and damage.

Regarding the 3% civilians killed in IDF operations against Palestinian terrorists in urban settings, the military would say this is much lower than on any other front, and critics would argue that killing 25-30 civilians is too high in comparison to the low level threat presented by West Bank terror.

Another sign that Bluth does not yet have control over the situation came when he himself was attacked and chased by dozens of Jewish extremists during a visit to Hebron on November 22. This came only a few weeks after two female IDF soldiers were injured by Jewish extremists at Givat Assaf when the military tried to prevent them from destroying Palestinian olive groves.

Jewish expansion and the destruction of Palestinian property

Bluth is less fully responsible for some of the issues relating to alleged land theft by Jewish extremists, the building of illegal outposts on Palestinian land, or enforcement to bulldoze such outposts.

Operationally, he gives the order if an outpost is to be bulldozed and his soldiers are supposed to prevent destruction of property.

But Bluth’s view is that these issues also implicate the IDF’s West Bank Civil Administration and the administration now passes the ball on this to Betzalel Smotrich’s new foothold in the Defense Ministry, or on some issues that the police should be the lead.

Neither the IDF Central Command nor the Civil Administration provided statistics about how many illegal Jewish outposts have been taken down during Bluth’s era.

It is public knowledge that the IDF has demolished an illegal outpost at Oz Zion multiple times, including again around two weeks ago, after Jewish extremists illegally rebuilt it.

The Post has also learned that an attack by Jewish extremists on the Palestinian town of Beit Furik, in which some property was torched, was prevented from being a much larger and worse incident by quick moves by the IDF to block a larger group from joining in the attack.

The International Crisis Group (ICG) has said that 2023 saw Israel approve nearly 13,000 new housing units in Judea and Samaria as well as the erection of an unprecedented number of new illegal outposts Since the beginning of 2024, ICG stated that Israel has declared new state ownership of almost 6,000 acres of West Bank land, more than in any previous calendar year.

Next, ICG accused Jewish extremists of destroying nearly 23,000 Palestinian-owned trees and a mix of those extremists and IDF activities leading to 1,378 Palestinians being displaced. In some instances, Israel’s position is that Palestinian built illegally, but the government and the military do not share numbers on the issue. Meanwhile, the Palestinians say that they almost never get approval to build anywhere.

Some of these issues are political, and have no criminal side to them, while some have a clear criminal element to them.

A large problem that again goes beyond what Bluth can handle alone, is that many Israeli defense and legal officials have acknowledged that enforcement against low-grade Jewish attacks on Palestinians and their property has always been weak, and has gotten much worse under National Security Minister Itamar Ben Gvir.

There are some cases where the Shin Bet arrests Jewish extremists when a Palestinian is killed and those cases often lead to prosecutions, but many Jewish attackers, especially with lower-grade violence, are never caught.

Here, the IDF has admitted it could do more, but no one is expecting that Bluth will succeed more than his predecessors, and some think that with his extra personal focus on attacking Palestinian terrorists, that he may pay even less attention to Jewish attacks.

Other issues like the government’s limiting of Palestinian workers from the West Bank coming into Israel to around 10,000 as opposed to the pre-war numbers of 210,000, defense sources view this as causing significant increases in Palestinian violence, but this is another political decision.

Generally, the Palestinian Authority is viewed as working better with Israel than before the war, but it is still too weak to assert its authority in certain portions of the West Bank, and this reality weakens the security environment.

After all of that, there are probably more questions than answers about where things stand under Bluth, and four months Is still a short time to compete against much longer term trends of violence.

The real test will be whether he can restore greater stability now than the broader war is coming to a close.