The ceaseless developments in the West Bank and the neighboring countries reveal how complex Israel’s strategic position has become. In the past, this situation could be expressed succinctly enough: the Palestinian struggle against the Israeli occupation alongside a balance of deterrence in favor of Israel against its neighbors’ conventional armies. This was the case even when these countries were controlled by hostile regimes.

But this reality has split into a raft of sub-segments where the motives and intentions are difficult to assess.

The chaos in the Arab world, which will soon be in its fifth year, affects Israel in many ways. This transformation underscores the realization in Jerusalem that “stable instability” cannot be preserved for much longer. The chaos in the region affects Israel, too, even if it doesn’t lead to an immediate escalation on the border.

Army Radio has reported that behind the rocket fired at the western Negev on Friday was an extremist Palestinian Salafi group in the Gaza Strip, linked to another jihadist group active mainly in the Sinai Peninsula, Ansar Bait al-Maqdis.Hamas arrested five suspects after the rocket attack; Israel then closed the crossings into the Gaza Strip for two days.

Israeli defense officials are concerned that the rocket fire is connected less to increasing tensions in the Gaza Strip and more to events in Jerusalem and on the Temple Mount. That is, the Gaza extremist group, against the will of Hamas, responded to the escalation in Jerusalem after the assassination attempt on rightist Yehuda Glick and the killing of the suspected gunman by the police’s special forces.

Read the article in full at Haaretz.