The recently discovered "primitive" rockets near Tulkarem, only a few kilometers from Highway 6 in central Israel, are not the first such devices the IDF and the Shin Bet security agency have intercepted in advance. Dozens of similar attempts have been uncovered in recent years along the security barrier facing Israel's central region. This is precisely how the process began in Gaza between 2000 and 2002, when terrorists first turned to home-made rocket production.
Gazans extracted explosives from land mines, mixed them with improvised substances and used hollow metal pipes or anything else they could find. Much of this work took place in garages and workshops. In Gaza, the first batches of propellant were made at home from sugar and chemical fertilizer. Later, metalworkers began adding stabilizing fins made of steel sheet. The same process is now taking place in Judea and Samaria, with one crucial difference: unlike Gaza at the time, the IDF and the Shin Bet are physically present on the ground, both operationally and in intelligence gathering.
After what happened in Gaza, there is a clear understanding, at least regarding Judea and Samaria, that no one will do this work for Israel—not the US, not international forces, not an Arab multinational force and not the Palestinian Authority. You can "kill it when it's small" only if you are there. That is what the IDF and the Shin Bet are trying to do, and often succeeding at, in the face of efforts by Hamas and by Iran to turn these improvised rockets into a meaningful threat, just as Gaza did until October 7.
Judea and Samaria, at least as far as we known, is being handled. The problem is still, and once again, Gaza. Israel's decision to allow a foreign force into the Strip, a force that will de facto bear responsibility for counterterrorism, or part of that responsibility, shows that we still have not fully recovered from the mindset that prevailed until October 6, 2023.
While in Gaza Israel was burned by a boiling reality, in Judea and Samaria the approach is cautious and cold. Yet in post-war Gaza Israel appears to be repeating the same mistake. Rockets are once again being made there, only now with far greater experience. The Gazans who once used these weapons will not hesitate to do so again the moment the opportunity serves them.
Israel's success in preventing Jenin and Tulkarem from developing a real rocket threat is the direct result of complete freedom of action for the IDF and the Shin Bet, with no restrictions. Preventing Gaza from rebuilding a new rocket and missile arsenal depends on Israel maintaining the same freedom of action inside Gaza, both within the "yellow line" security perimeter and beyond it. This is what Israel must insist on with President Donald Trump and his team. If Israel has not secured such operational and intelligence freedom from the US, then it is in trouble. Phase two must not move forward even a millimeter unless this guarantee is in place.
Run through the images in your mind of Sderot and other communities around Gaza, where residents spent years racing to shelters or lying on the ground several times a week as rockets whistled overhead and exploded nearby. That memory makes clear how essential this is. The rockets revealed in Tulkarem serve not only as a warning regarding Judea and Samaria, but also as a reminder about Gaza. The rocket threat from Gaza may have diminished dramatically, but it has not been eliminated and Gazans are trying and will continue trying to rebuild it.
