Tubas- A week ago, the Al-Far’a camp near the city of Tubas in the northern West Bank witnessed an occupation army raid that left 7 martyrs and many injured, in an assassination operation described as the most violent. Two days later, the occupation stormed Tubas itself, surrounded the homes of wanted persons, and fired Energa rockets at them.
Despite their horror, these were not the first and only occupation incursions into Tubas. Rather, the city experienced them on an almost daily basis, with the occupation claiming to be pursuing “persecutors” who had disturbed the city and intensified its strikes against its soldiers and settlers.
Like other cities in the northern West Bank, Tubas marked an early path on the map of the Palestinian struggle, which expanded in scope during the last two years, and constituted one of the most important cases of effective resistance, through what became known as brigades and groups.
It was not long before the Al-Quds Brigades – the military wing of the Islamic Jihad Movement – announced the launch of the “Tubas Brigade” in mid-June of last year, until the resistance factions, especially the Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas), became involved in the same trend and began targeting the occupation. .
This “quiet city,” as its people describe it, did not remain calm, but rather confronted the occupation, clashed with it, and succeeded in thwarting its missions by arresting wanted persons.
Fedayeen portal
Tubas cast the shadow of its resistance over its surrounding villages and camps. Fighting groups were formed in the towns of Aqaba, Tammoun, and Al-Faraa camp under different names and with a common goal: resisting the occupation and curbing its attacks.
Before that, the resistance of Tubas rose up outside the borders of their city. Ahmed Atef Daraghmeh was martyred in Nablus while confronting the settlers’ storming of Joseph’s Tomb in the city, and Ahmed Abu Salah followed him in the city of Jenin.
Regarding the state of the resistance in Tubas, the city’s social activist, Omar Ainbousi, says that it has a historical legacy and is not the result of today’s events. It formed one of the pillars of the Palestinian revolution in 1965 and ignited the spark of its permanent fuel.
By virtue of its border location and its description as “the eastern gateway for the guerrillas with Jordan and Palestine occupied in 1948,” it paved the way for the revolutionaries to cross, as individuals and groups, and to smuggle ammunition and resistance weapons.
As an extension of the general state of resistance in the West Bank, the Tubas resistance became evident, and its armed cells were formed to confront the occupation, which rushed with all its might to get rid of it, due to its influence on the numerous and nearby settlements and military points.
Emission factors
According to Ainbusi’s interview with Tel Aviv Tribune Net, there are many factors that contributed to the rapid restructuring of the Tubas resistance, in addition to public anger and the blockage of the political horizon in front of its young generation affected by its rebellious surroundings, most notably the city’s geographical location and the horizontal urban expansion that enhanced its population density.
Its direct contact, with its only camp and the surrounding villages, also facilitated the acceleration of the formation of its resistance groups, and Ainbusi says, “In Tubas, which is dominated by a religious and conservative rural character, a generation was born that has not been tamed and whose brain has not been erased, and it lives the ideological dimension in all its meanings.”
In Tubas and the northern Jordan Valley – which constitute most of the city’s territory – the occupation escalated the pace of settlement there, and pursued its people and expelled them from it. More than 90% of its land area, estimated at about 400 square kilometers, was turned into closed military areas for the purposes of military training (7 camps and 33 settlement).
About 50% of these military lands are forbidden for citizens to use, and thus the people of Tubas, most of whom work in agriculture, have lost their source of livelihood. Data from the Palestinian Ministry of Economy indicate that the agricultural sector in Tubas has recorded a loss of 70% since the beginning of the aggression on Gaza.
Tubas controls only 8% of its entire land area, which are areas classified as “A” according to the Oslo divisions. According to Ainbusi, “this 8% is now threatened by the occupation’s incursions and its daily persecution of citizens, and their harassment through its surrounding military checkpoints, in addition to settler attacks that have displaced hundreds of Palestinians.” Their livestock and agricultural equipment were confiscated.”
Mounting resistance
Ainbusi concluded that all attempts by the occupation to end the phenomenon of resistance in Tubas failed and had counterproductive results against it, and that all the pressures exerted against the young men who rose up to domesticate and tame them did not discourage them, but rather their popular incubator expanded, and their numbers increased and they became more prepared and equipped, which is evident through the ferocity of the confrontation. They confronted the occupation and carried out resistance attacks.
The Palestine Information Center (Ma’ta) indicates that 318 resistance actions have been carried out in Tubas since the beginning of this year, the most prominent of which were 80 shooting operations, the shooting down of a reconnaissance plane, and the martyrdom of 22 of its people, the most prominent of whom was Sheikh Omar Daraghmeh (58 years old), a leader of the Hamas movement, who was martyred. In the occupation prisons, days after his arrest.
Explosion of political solutions
Member of the Tubas Factional Coordination Committee, Basil Mansour, attributes what is happening in this “quiet city” to the rule of “violence begets violence.” He told Tel Aviv Tribune Net that “the occupation closed all political, economic and other horizons to the people of the city, which is known as the food basket of the Palestinians, and cut off their limbs by depriving them of access to their lands.” Through its military checkpoints,” he added, “the citizen has become threatened with his livelihood.”
Mansour went on to say, “The violence of the occupation overturned even the option of a two-state solution for the Palestinians, and they began to call for a single Palestinian state from the river to the sea, in the face of the lack of all political solutions.” He added, “All political factors exploded in Tubas, and it was no longer a calm and promising city of peace, and its resistance was affected.” In its Palestinian surroundings.
It is likely that the state of resistance will escalate in Tubas, especially in light of the rapid formation of armed cells there and the arrival of weapons to them. He added, “When weapons are available, they become easy to use.”
Palestinian political researcher Ahmed Abu Al-Hija concludes by saying, “In order for this resistance to be more successful, it must become accustomed to the usual pattern of guerrilla warfare, which is secret and trained groups that operate according to planning and the logic of ambushes. Aside from showmanship, this pattern is more rewarding, less exhausting, and more convincing to society.” .
