Holy Land: Members of the Jewish community worship at the Western Wall in Jerusalem, the front-line city in Israel’s ongoing war on terror

Report: Cliff Caswell
Pictures: Mike Weston

AS Israeli soldier Jonathan Kupperman tore after a fleeing terror suspect in a busy town near Tel Aviv, he was well aware of the murderous possibilities he was facing.

In hot pursuit of a man he had seen wearing a padded winter coat in the rising spring heat, he was focused on the very real prospect that he was chasing a suicide bomber. And the potential killer was running for a busy coffee shop.

With his heart in his mouth, Kupperman managed to
catch and pull the suspect to the ground, but as he fell
his worst suspicions were confirmed.

The human bomb detonated his lethal cargo leaving the soldier exposed to the full extent of the blast and fighting for his life.

“Jonathan was in hospital for six months and lost three of the fingers on his right hand,” his grandfather Noah, CO of the Yasham counter-terrorism unit in the Israeli Police, recalled. “He was wounded in the town of Netanya some 60 years to the day that I was injured in Jerusalem – I was hit by four bullets during a riot a couple of months before the British troops left in 1948.”

The Kuppermans’ experience of terrorism is not unique. Ever since the UK pulled back from the region six decades ago, generations of families have faced a terror threat that has slowly but surely made its way around the world. In Mumbai, gunmen recently killed scores of people in a sophisticated assault while the spectre of the suicide bomber arrived in London in July 2005.

But the daily reality of attack has led
Israel to establish one of the most robust counter-terrorism regimes in the world. In a model that is now the focus of attention in the wake of Mumbai, the security forces have developed an elaborate intelligence and strike network to hit would-be offenders first.

On the front line of the war on terror in Jerusalem, they are on constant readiness. Above a controversial security fence separating Palestinian settlements from the city centre, a lone police fort looks out over the simmering hills of the Holy Land where patrolling officers relentlessly trawl for trouble.

“It is quieter at the moment than it has been for some time. After the Palestinian uprising early in the decade there were a lot of problems and buses were exploding in terror attacks every other day,” Israeli Police spokesman and army veteran Micky Rosenfeld told Soldier. “During that period up to 1,000 citizens were killed, but now the security fence that we established in Jerusalem has proved both effective and efficient.

“The terrorists are constantly trying to improve their own methods, so we are working 24/7 to deter them. Having good intelligence means we can stop 90 per cent of planned attacks, although there is no such thing as complete, 100 per cent protection. But when it is quiet, as it is now, you know that what we are doing is working.”

The structure of the Israeli Forces is certainly well placed to deal with the complex threat. The Border Police, a domestic security outfit with military-trained staff, packs a powerful punch to provide the backbone of the front-line defence.

These units have embedded specialists including snipers, covert surveillance experts and dog handlers, so there is no need to call on any back up teams on operations. The troops are also highly trained in stealth, observation and camouflage.

On Jerusalem’s streets, regular police units are keyed up to fight any threat that finds its way through the net. Specialist units including the Yassam motorcyclists, who are trained to break through gridlocked traffic and shoot their M16 rifles on the move, can quickly be deployed to the scene of any trouble.

Despite having a highly-organised system to deal with attacks, Bob Mountwitten, a volunteer superintendent serving in the Jerusalem District with the Yasham unit, said that there were always occasions when unpredictable attacks occurred.

In July last year a construction worker rammed his excavator into a string of vehicles and pedestrians, killing three people and injuring dozens more before he was shot dead by an off-duty soldier. More civilians were hurt in a copycat attack just weeks later while other would-be insurgents have been intercepted in covert ops.

“You have to know where the threat is coming from as there is so much happening around you all the time,” Mountwitten, who served a stint in the British Royal Regiment of Fusiliers and the Australian Black Watch before enlisting in the Israeli Forces, admitted. “Fortunately the intelligence network here is well set up. Absolutely everything is noted, even down to every car we stop, and it all goes on the computer so that it can be accessed by the whole security network.

“Israel is different to the UK, but the same rules apply to me as to a policeman in London. I can’t open fire unless I come under attack and, even if I think about pulling my gun, I have to write a report.”

While Mountwitten admitted that life in Jerusalem had proved to be quieter in 2008 than in recent years, he was adamant there was no end yet to the terror threat.

Just as British troops on ops in Iraq and Afghanistan have had to accept that bombers will sometimes find a way through, the superintendent conceded the Israeli authorities were resigned to casualties.

“It has been a constant battle – nothing changed for us even after the 9/11 attacks on the Pentagon and World Trade Centre,” he said. “There is a saying in the Australian armed forces that the price of freedom is eternal vigilance – and that is the game we are playing.”