On June 29, close to 11 p.m., an unidentified vehicle opened fire on an Israeli car traveling on Alon Road close to the Shiloh settlement in the West Bank. The four friends in the Israeli car were wounded by the long string of gunshots fired from a passing vehicle that disappeared quickly into the night. The next day, Malachi Rosenfeld, 25, died of his injuries. The friends were returning from a basketball game, held under the aegis of the regional Israeli Samaria basketball league, in Eli settlement. Rosenfeld’s brother Yitzhaki, an Israeli air force pilot, had been killed 13 years earlier in a large flash flood near the Tze'elim River.

This was the sixth attack in 10 days on Alon Road. Yet Israeli security services continue to declare resolutely that “this is not an intifada.”

On July 2, Palestinians will mark a year since the death of Arab youth Mohammed Abu Khdeir, who was murdered by three Israelis in retaliation for the abduction and murder of three Israeli youths in the Etzion settlement on June 12, 2014. The event of the murder of the Palestinian youth, who was set on fire by his killers, sent shock waves through the territories a year ago and triggered a large wave of riots, mainly in East Jerusalem. Less than a week later, Operation Protective Edge broke out in the Gaza Strip. Israel’s security establishment is gearing up to deal with the anniversary of the murder, but they continue to emphasize that there is no "intifada energy" in the territories. They publicly say that what is happening is a succession of terror attacks, the likes of which we have seen in the past. These are "public mood-dependent terror attacks" — more spontaneous in nature and connected to Ramadan. The Israel Defense Forces' operational challenge, they say, is to get its hands on the perpetrators, nip the situation in the bud and find the right combination to minimize negative effects during Ramadan, while making life more difficult for those trying to exploit the month of fasting for terror attacks.

“Look around you,” a high-level Israel security source told me on condition of anonymity last week. “Tell me, who in the region has a Ramadan table as abundant and relaxed as those of the Palestinians in Judea and Samaria. Syria? The Ramadan there is bloody, millions of refugees, hundreds of thousands of casualties, a destroyed economy and entire regions on the cusp of famine. Lebanon? A blood bath is taking place there as well and there is deep worry over Hezbollah’s fate and the trickling of Syrian atrocities into Lebanon. In the Sinai Peninsula? There’s war in Sinai. Jordan? They are shaking with fear over the threats surrounding them; the Islamic State [IS] is almost on their doorstep. Besides, the standard of living of most Jordanians is lower than the standard of living of the Palestinians here, and lower by dozens of percentages than the standard of living of Israeli Arabs. So why do they need an intifada?”