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| Netanyahu: ‘There is no more containment of threats… If you don’t come to the jungle, the jungle comes to you’ |
| 2026-02-20 |
| [IsraelTimes] Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tells an IDF graduation ceremony for officer cadets that Israeli security policy now eschews the notion of “containing” threats, indicating, instead, that Israel now actively confronts threats beyond its borders. “If you don’t come to the jungle, the jungle comes to you,” he also notes. The two sets of comments signal that Israel under Netanyahu has shifted to a more aggressive orientation in the wake of the Hamas-led invasion and massacre on October 7, 2023. “There is no more containment of threats. There is no more Mabam,” the prime minister says, using the Hebrew acronym for the “campaign between wars.” The “Mabam” military concept guided IDF operations, notably in Syria and Lebanon, for the decade before October 7, 2023. Netanyahu was in office for all but 18 months of that period. In 2013, Israel understood that the civil war in Syria offered an opportunity. The fraying Syrian army meant that Israel enjoyed unprecedented freedom of action in the country to fight against Iranian entrenchment and Hezbollah’s military buildup, without committing ground troops and entering deeper conflict. The IDF effort that emerged from that understanding was called Mabam. Netanyahu also says that there is no more concept of the “villa in the jungle, in which you hide from the predators over the walls. If you don’t come to the jungle, the jungle comes to you.” The “villa in the jungle” phrase is said to have originated with Ehud Barak, who gave a 1996 speech as foreign minister to Jewish communal leaders in St. Louis, saying, “The dreams and aspirations of many in the Arab world have not changed. We still live in a modern and prosperous villa in the middle of the jungle, a place where different laws prevail. No hope for those who cannot defend themselves and no mercy for the weak.” |
| Posted by:trailing wife |