This weekend, the Muslim holy month of Ramadan commences—a time of prayer and celebration for most, but also a time that usually sees an uptick in Palestinian terrorism. The flurry of Jewish activity in preparation for Passover, which begins in mid-April, will likely provide additional targets, and motivation, for terrorists. After the deadly stabbing in Be’er Sheva a week ago, and another in Hadera on Sunday, writes Yoav Limor, Israel must be on high alert

Unlike the terrorist attack in Be’er Sheva last week, Sunday’s incident seemed more premeditated. Not one terrorist who acts for personal motives, but two gunmen with a small arsenal and automatic weapons, [carried it out]. The past month has seen nine terrorist attacks that left six people dead. Such a sequence of events cannot be coincidental. Even if each attack stands on its own, there is a clear sense that they draw inspiration from each other. This is certainly true in the case of the Beersheba and Hadera attacks, carried out by Arab Israelis who were Islamic State sympathizers.

The growing involvement of Arab Israelis in terrorism is an issue that must now top the government’s agenda. True, this is a fringe minority that cannot be projected on the entire sector, and yet—it is impossible to turn a blind eye to the mounting events, certainly given the riots that took place during Operation Guardian of the Walls in May 2021.

This [problem] is further compounded by the growing anarchy in the Arab sector and the loss of governance in large parts of the Negev and the Galilee. It is high time to take action and introduce a real, detailed, budgeted national plan, and to stop treating the matter as if we are fated to tolerate it.

Israel will likely respond directly against Iran after yesterday’s attack, and has made known that it will calibrate its retaliation based not on the extent of the damage, but on the scale of the attack. The specifics are anyone’s guess, but Edward Luttwak has a suggestion, put forth in an article published just hours before the missile barrage: cut off Tehran’s ability to send money and arms to Shiite Arab militias.

In practice, most of this cash comes from a single source: oil. . . . In other words, the flow of dollars that sustains Israel’s enemies, and which has caused so much trouble to Western interests from the Syrian desert to the Red Sea, emanates almost entirely from the oil loaded onto tankers at the export terminal on Khark Island, a speck of land about 25 kilometers off Iran’s southern coast. Benjamin Netanyahu warned in his recent speech to the UN General Assembly that Israel’s “long arm” can reach them too. Indeed, Khark’s location in the Persian Gulf is relatively close. At 1,516 kilometers from Israel’s main airbase, it’s far closer than the Houthis’ main oil import terminal at Hodeida in Yemen—a place that was destroyed by Israeli jets in July, and attacked again [on Sunday].