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Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps in Jenin, Psychological Warfare, and the West's Perceptual Failure

(Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs) Aviram Balleishe and the Jerusalem Center-Iran Desk - Foreign media coverage of the events in Jenin have erroneously reported that the Iranian regime's recent terror and influence operations in the city were a "Palestinian-Israeli clash." Yet statements by Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, senior IRGC officials, and the regime's official news agencies - documented here - present the broader strategic implementation of the IRGC's West Bank operations. Statements from Palestinian officials also support the IRGC's operations program. There is a clear need to change the false narrative of young Palestinian freedom fighters struggling against the "Zionist occupier" to a more accurate narrative that reflects a carefully planned, Iranian regime-backed initiative that supports and directs Palestinian terror activity from the West Bank against Israeli civilians. The battle in the West Bank, and Jenin specifically, is not an Israeli-Palestinian conflict per se but part of a more significant Iranian-Israeli conflict, part of Iran's plans to support and build up terror capabilities along Israel's borders and in Gaza and the West Bank. This document underscores the need for Israel to wage a soft-power war of perception alongside its counter-terror operations in Jenin to eliminate the IRGC-supported Palestinian terrorist nests there. Simultaneously, Israel must provide the Palestinians with the evidence that what matters to the present Iranian regime is not Palestinian welfare, but the Shiite revolution. Aviram Balleishe, Senior Director, Security, Diplomacy, and Communications at the Jerusalem Center, has served in senior government positions for over 25 years as a business intelligence and Middle East specialist, negotiation expert, and international cooperation manager.
2023-08-24 00:00:00
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