The defense establishment believes that the terror attack that took place on Passover eve near the Palestinian village of Idhna, which claimed the life of 47-year-old Baruch Mizrahi, a chief superintendent in the Israel Police, was an isolated attack unrelated to the current stalemate in the peace talks, and therefore does not represent a shift in the situation in Judea and Samaria. In the hours following the attack, defense officials hedged that it was the work of a lone gunman -- a man carrying out an attack without the help of accomplices and without telling anyone beforehand. Terror plots by lone attackers are nearly impossible to thwart, as an individual who does not share his thoughts and plans with anyone leaves no intelligence trail. As the investigation progressed, however, defense officials have come to believe that the attack might have been the work of a small terror cell, possibly one affiliated with Hamas. This has also led the Shin Bet security agency and Israel Defense Forces to confidently say that the perpetrators will be caught, despite the fact that the last terror attack that happened in the area in September 2013, in which Staff Sgt. Gal (Gabriel) Kobi was killed by a Palestinian sniper, has remained unsolved. The immediate premise was that the terrorist had come from Idhna -- a large Palestinian village adjacent to the Green Line. Part of the pressure to find the terrorist or the cell he belongs to stems from security forces' concern that terrorism will once again find its way to the heart of Israel. But the dense residential setting of the village, compounded by the fact that some 90 percent of its residents are part of one clan -- the Tameizi family, which can hardly be described as Israel-friendly -- have made the investigation difficult. Mizrahi is the first Israeli killed in a terror attack in the West Bank in 2014. Four Israelis were killed in such attacks in 2013 -- Evyatar Borovsky, who was killed near Tapuach Junction; IDF Sgt. Tomer Hazan, who was abducted and killed near Qalqilya; Col. (res.) Sraya (Yaya) Ofer, who was killed at his Jordan Valley home, and Kobi. The fifth victim, Cpl. Eden Atias, was killed within the Green Line, but the circumstances of his murder were directly connected to the situation in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. The defense establishment has ruled that these terror attacks were unrelated and that they did not represent a new wave of terror. This week, given the crisis plaguing the peace talks, the Shin Bet and IDF have had to re-evaluate whether the situation in Judea and Samaria is heading toward escalation. The majority opinion negates this premise, believing that the Palestinian Authority has no interest in seeing a security escalation --- mostly because it fears it will lose control of the situation on the ground. The PA's desire to keep things under control is evident in the collaboration between Israeli and Palestinian security forces, which continues despite the stalling peace talks. It was also evident by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas' condemnation of the attack. Israel expected to hear such a statement, but the move evoked criticism on the Palestinian street, which sees terror attacks in the West Bank as a given, especially when the fatality is a member of the Israeli security forces. Defense officials believe that Abbas' statement was a clear signal to Israel that not only does the PA denounce terror -- it seeks to remove any obstacles that might hinder the peace talks further. Despite the return of American mediator Martin Indyk to the region and the attempts by both sides to forge on with the negotiations, the gaps between Israel and the PA remains significant, and currently focus on two issues: the potential release of Israeli Arab terrorists as part of the fourth phase of prisoners' release, and whether or not the next moratorium imposed on settlement construction would be partial or full. The decision on both issues lies with the Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Abbas. Their procrastination only pushes the solution farther, not only because each leader uses the stalemate to further dig in his heels, but mostly because it breeds boisterous opposition on each side. Sources privy to the peace talks said the next few days are no less than "critical" to the negotiation's future. Resuming the negotiations will help facilitate calm on the ground, and it will most likely increase the PA's motivation to fight terror, but failure to reignite the talks might result in an opposite trend and increased unrest on the ground -- with or without a guiding hand.
