Battle of Jenin - Battle

Battle

Israeli forces entered Jenin on April 2. On the first day, reserve company commander Moshe Gerstner was killed in a PIJ sector. This caused a further delay. By April 3, the city was secured, but the fighting in the camp was just beginning. Israeli sources say that the IDF incursion into the camp relied primarily on infantry to minimize civilian casualties, but interviews with eyewitnesses suggest that tanks and helicopters were also used in the first two days. In Pierre Rehov's documentary The Road to Jenin, a Palestinian doctor claimed that on the second day, the city's hospital was hit by eleven tank shells. However, both Rehov's film and Richard Landes's 2005 film Pallywood, the supposed hits shown on Jenin hospital were compared to an actual building hit by Merkava tank shelling, suggesting that the supposed hit marks were staged.

To reach the camp, a Caterpillar D-9 armored bulldozer drove along a three-quarter-mile stretch of the main street to clear it of booby traps. An Israeli Engineering Corps officer logged 124 separate explosions set off by the bulldozer. A Fatah leader in the camp later said that it was only when his forces saw the Israelis advancing on foot that they decided to stay and fight.

On the third day, the Palestinians were still dug in, defying Israeli expectations, and by then seven Israeli soldiers had been killed. Mardawi later testified to having killed two of them from close range, using an M-16. As the IDF advanced, the Palestinians fell back to the heavily defended camp center – the Hawashin district. AH-1 Cobra helicopters were used to strike Palestinian positions on rooftops using wire-guided missiles, and about a dozen armored D-9 bulldozers were deployed, widening alleys, clearing paths for tanks, and detonating booby traps. Palestinians said that Israeli troops rode atop the bulldozers and fired rocket propelled grenades.

On April 6, Mahmoud Tawallbe and two other militants went into a house so as to get close enough to a tank or armored D-9 bulldozer to plant a bomb. Tawallbe and another militant were killed during the action. A British military expert working in the camp for Amnesty International reported that a D9 driver saw him, and subsequently rammed a wall down onto him and one of his fighters. The Islamic Jihad website announced that Tawallbe had died when he blew up in his booby-trapped home on the Israeli soldiers inside it, and that he "had thwarted all attempts by the occupation to evacuate the camp residents to make it easier for the Israelis to destroy on the heads of the fighters." On that same day, IDF attack helicopters reportedly increased their missile attacks, which slowed but did not cease the next day.

IDF chief of staff (Ramatkal) Shaul Mofaz urged the officers to speed things up. They asked for twenty-four more hours. Mofaz told reporters that the fighting would be complete by the end of the week, April 6. In some of the sectors, the forces were advancing at a rate of fifty meters a day. Israeli intelligence assumed that the vast majority of the camp's residents were still in it. Most commanders argued that this obligated a careful advance for fear of striking civilians, and warned that using excessive force would cost the lives of hundreds of Palestinians. Lieutenant Colonel Ofek Buchris, commander of the 51st Battalion, was left in a minority opinion, saying "We're being humiliated here for four days now". When Mofaz instructed the officers to be more aggressive and fire five antitank missiles at every house before entering, one of them contemplated disobedience. Meanwhile, when asked how long he thought his forces could last given the superiority of the Israeli forces, Abu Jandal said: ""No. That's not true. We have the weapon of surprise. We have the weapon of honor. We have the divine weapon, the weapon of Allah who stands at our side. We have weapons that are better than theirs. I am the one with the truth, and I put my faith in Allah, while they put their faith in a tank".

Buchris continued to employ the tactics of softening up enemy resistance with antitank fire and extensive use of bulldozers, developing a method to expose IDF soldiers to less risk: first, a bulldozer would ram the corner of a house, opening a hole, and then an IDF Achzarit troop carrier would arrive to disembark troops into the house, where they would clear it of any militants found inside. Buchris' battalion was advancing faster than the reserve forces, creating a bridgehead within the camp that attracted most of the Palestinian fire. During the first week of fighting, the battalion suffered five casualties. On April 8, Golani Brigade commander, Colonel Tamir, arrived from Nablus. Having crawled with Buchris to the front line, he warned that the fighting style must be changed completely – call in more troops and perhaps take the command out of the reserve brigade's hand. A total of 30 Palestinians and 2 Israeli soldiers were killed in Jenin on that same day. By evening, division commander Brigadier General Eyal Shlein told his men that the mission must be accomplished by 6:00 PM on April 9. Buchris himself was later badly wounded.

At 6:00 AM on April 9, reserve battalion 7020s support company was ordered to form a new line, west of the former one. Its commander, Major Oded Golomb, set out with a force to take a position in a new house. He strayed from the original path, perhaps for tactical considerations, but failed to report to his commander. The force walked into a Palestinian ambush, finding themselves in an inner courtyard surrounded by tall houses (later nicknamed "the bathtub") and under fire from all directions, and were also attacked by a suicide bomber. Rescue forces from the company and the battalion hurried to the location and were attacked with small-arms fire and explosive charges. The exchange of fire went on for several hours.

A reconnaissance aircraft documented much of the fight and the footage was transmitted live and was watched in the Israeli Central Command war room by the high-ranking officers. Thirteen Israeli soldiers were killed, and the Palestinians managed to snatch three of the bodies and drag them into a nearby house. Colonel Ram, the Shayetet commander who had fought in the camp with his men, quickly assembled a rescue force. Mofaz told him that negotiation over the bodies might force the IDF to halt the operation and get it in trouble similar to the 2000 Hezbollah cross-border raid. On the edge of the alley leading to "the bathtub", Ram questioned the wounded reservists. Finally, he broke with his troops to the nearby house and engaged Palestinian militants, eventually locating the bodies. In the afternoon, all Israeli casualties were evacuated from the area. It became the deadliest day for the IDF since the end of the 1982 Lebanon War.

During that day, the IDF censored reports on the events, leading to a wave of rumors. Partial information leaked through phone calls made by reservists and internet sites. By evening, when Chief of Central Command, Brigadier General Yitzhak Eitan, had a press conference, there were rumors of a helicopter carrying dozens of troops shot down, the death of the Ramatkal's deputy, and a heart attack suffered by the Minister of Defense.

After the ambush, all Israeli forces began to advance by Buchris' tactics, utilizing armored bulldozers and Achzarit APCs in their push. Israeli forces also relied heavily on increased missile strikes from helicopters. Several officers demanded that F-16 jets be sent to bomb the camp, but the IDF High Command refused. The dozen bulldozers and APCs pushed deep into the heart of the camp, flattening a built-up area of 200 square yards, destroying militant strongpoints. Palestinian resistance quickly collapsed, and the remaining militants retreated into the Hawashin neighborhood.

IDF forces then began mopping up the final resistance in the Hawashin neighborhood. At 7:00 AM on April 11, the Palestinians began to surrender. Qabha refused to surrender and was killed, being among the last to die. Zakaria Zubeidi was among the only fighters who did not surrender. He slipped out of the area surrounded by the IDF, moved through the houses and left. Mardawi surrendered along with Ali Suleiman al-Saadi, known as "Safouri", and thirty-nine others. He later said that "There was nothing I could do against that bulldozer".