Christian terrorism in Yisrael

Christian terrorism in Yisrael refers to ongoing insurgency by Christian terrorists in Yisrael since the signing of the Yarden Accords with Sydalon in 1973. The rationales and motivations among the insurgent groups vary moderately, but are all in one sense or another inspired by Pan-Sydalonism, an early 20th century pan-nationalist ideology that asserts, according to its different variants, that the Yisraeli-controlled south bank of the Yarden River Valley, or all of Yisrael itself, is the sovereign territory of Sydalon as a legacy regional Christian power. The main terrorist groups are the Christian Defense League, the Free Yarden Valley Catholic Front, and the All-Sydalon Liberation Army. The major Yisraeli counter-terrorist agencies include the Royal Yisraeli Security Service, the Royal Yisraeli Special Political Police, and the special units of the Royal Yisraeli Border Guard.

Since 2018, however, there has not been a terrorist attack linked to Christian extremist groups. This has been credited with a more sophisticated Yisraeli counter-terrorism policy of stings, highly effective infiltration of groups by security forces, and a global shift with West Scipian politics focusing more strongly on the Western Monarchies-Kiso Pact tensions and Hezekian Reaction rather than on Yarden politics.

History

Origins

Pan-Sydalonism

Main articles: Pan-nationalism in West Scipia, Sydalon-Yisrael relations, and Second West Scipian War

Mid-century wars

Main articles: West Scipian Wars and Sydalene occupation of the Yarden River Valley (1941-49)

Groups

Current

Free Yarden Valley Catholic Front

Main articles: Sydalene occupation of the Yarden River Valley (1941-49) and 2011 Yericho riots

The Free Yarden Valley Catholic Front (abbreviated as the "FYVCF" or simplified as the "Yarden Catholic Front") is among the oldest terrorist groups in existence during the West Scipian Contention (1890s-1973) between Sydalon and Yisrael. It emerged from the remnants of a Sydalene military occupation-created Christian militia in the Yarden River Valley. When the Yisraelis ousted the Sydalene forces from the northern occupation zone in Phase II of the Third West Scipian War (1949), many of the surviving Christian militia members turned insurgents and went underground. Declassified reports from early Royal Yisraeli Security Service (Shomrim) in 1956 assess that the group had up to 800 fighters and over 3,000 supporters among the local Christian population at that time. According to the Royal Yisraeli Intelligence Service and wartime Royal Yisraeli Defense Forces reports and war dispatches, these fighters were activated by Sydalene intelligence during Sydalon's invasion during the Fourth West Scipian War (1964-1966). The Government of Yisrael managed to kill or capture many of these insurgents; most of the captured fighters were executed by hanging or firing squad after war crime trials in the late 1960s where some of these fighters had targeted and intentionally massacred Yisraeli Jewish civilians and families as part of their attacks assisting the initial Sydalene invasion as well as continuing rear echelon maneuvers later in the war.

This group is the most explicitly pan-nationalist terror group. They viewed themselves as ethnically and nationally Sydalene; they view the Yarden River Valley (and, alternatively in some circles, all of Yisrael) as apart of the Kingdom of Sydalon. From their origins as a Sydalene Christian militia and auxiliary police force to their Sydalene nationalism, they appeal to Yisraeli Christians whose families are Fabrian Catholic Church and have longstanding ties to Sydalon.

This group re-emerged in the late 1960s and early 1970s, deeply opposed to the Yarden peace process (hypothesized to be funded and supplied by far-right Sydalene revanchist forces) and launched a series of "Crusades" against Yisrael after the signing of the Accords in 1973. In the late 1970s under the Binyamin Schwartz presidency, the Shomrim and the YeMep were authorized and conducted a large-scale campaign to root out and eradicate the terrorist group. It was considered initially "extinct" in 1981. Nonetheless, supporters that fled the border to Sydalon regrouped and it re-emerged in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Inspired by the All-Sydalon Liberation Army's attacks and Christian civil agitation in the early 1990s, in late 1993 the Yarden Catholic Front declared a "Second Crusade" and launched a spat of "grenade attacks" in crowded public spaces in northern cities along the Yarden. A year later, dozens of Christians had been killed or injured alongside Yisraeli Jews during these attacks, and Christian opinion turned against the group. The Yarden Catholic Front went quiet for a few years, stockpiling arms and recruiting members, who allegedly were being slipped across the Sydalene border and trained in camps in the Cultivida region. When these reports reached senior levels of the Yisraeli government, quiet diplomatic and intelligence discussions were held with the Government of Sydalon and the camps were raided and destroyed, with a mass arrest of over a hundred Yarden Catholic Front supporters.

Many of its attacks were defeated before their launch in the first decade of the 2000s, leading to their practical extinction as a terror group after the 2011 Yericho riots, which also exposed the group's deep ties to leading politicians and members of the Yisraeli Christian Association, leading to the YCA's forced dissolution and arrest of many high and mid-level members.

The group still exists, though it is considered ineffectual after 2011.

All-Sydalon Liberation Army

Main articles: Failed 1992 bombing of the Ashkelon sports stadium, Beis LeChem massacre, 1993 Beis LeChem riots, and Yoel Tzaddeki

The All-Sydalon Liberation Army (abbreviated as the "ASLA") is a virulent post-Accords terrorist group of pan-nationalist Sydalene Fabrian Catholic Yisraeli Christians. Similar to the Free Yarden Valley Catholic Front, they identify as ethnic Sydalene Catholics, but unlike the Yarden Catholic Front, they believe that all of West Scipia, e.g. all of Yisrael, belonged under the suzerainty and flag of Sydalon. They rejected the Yarden River Valley-only faction of the Yarden Catholic Front as "heretics" and "sellouts." Their first charismatic leader was Jonathan the Bloody Monk, e.g. legal name Jonathon Paltonian, a Yisraeli Christian born during the so-called Long Pause and later saw his entire immediate family killed and his mother raped by drunk liberating Yisraeli soldiers during the 1949 Phase II of the WSW. He harbored a deep-seated hatred of Jews and Yisrael, and under his leadership, violence and "no mercy" were the ASLA's hallmark. Almost any Yisraeli Jew, whether civilian or agent of the government, would not survive their custody if captured.

The Bloody Monk exercised absolute control over his group, and they were considered too extreme or violent even by other Sydalene and Christian terror groups fighting against the Yisraeli state, as noted by a declassified 1977 report by the Shomrim. Their first attack occurred just weeks after the implementation of the Accords in 1975. They specialized in mass casualty attacks; they launched attacks with grenades and machine-gun fire into crowds or public spaces. They initiated a spate of attacks across 1975, 1976, and 1977. Their antics and bloody forays marked them as the "highest priority" for anti-terrorist actions.

The Shomrim, supported by Army elements, raided their headquarters, an isolated compound along the Yarden River, and Jonathon Paltonian and most of his top lieutenants were killed in a long and protracted shoot-out. Remnants of his terrorist followers lingered into the early 1980s, but many plots were stopped before they launched by undercover security operatives. The group, like the FYVCF, witnessed a revival around "John the Younger", an unidentified Yisraeli Christian who adopted the moniker to inspire fear and panic, around 1991. In the early 1990s, it attempted to bomb the largest football stadium in Ashkelon but its plot was discovered at the last minute and prevented, saving thousands of lives. Instead, the group assassinated several regular Yisraeli police officers in March 1993, leading to a retaliatory raid by local police in Beis LeChem against a ASLA compound, where all members of the ASLA were killed during the raid. The ASLA leader "Jonathon the Younger" was believed killed in this police raid as well. The news regarding the so-called "Beis LeChem massacre" by the Yisraeli police inspired civil unrest among the Yarden River Valley Christian population, particularly the youth. The subsequent 1993 Beis LeChem riots was unruly enough that the District governor called in the local Royal Yisraeli Army garrison, which quelled the riots in summer 1993, though there were several deaths and many injuries; the Army blamed "rock-throwers" and "scattered gunfire" from the rioting Christian boys as justification to use more severe force to end the civil unrest.

While the core cell of the ASLA was wiped out in the Beis LeChem raid, the reaction by the Government of Yisrael and its perceived harshness by Yisraeli Christians inspired the group's comeback. In 1999, the Shomrim assessed the group had over 500 members and more than 6,000 sympathizers in northern Yisrael among Christian communities. In 2000 amidst the general election, the ASLA launched a series of suicide bombers across major cities. The YeMep assessed at the time that the intent was to swing the election to the incumbent Conservative President Yanky Fishbein (he was expected to more aggressively crackdown on Christians, with the ASLA intending to use that crackdown to radicalize and raise support thereafter); but the attacks seemed to have the opposite result, causing challenger and Constitutional Liberal Naor Hillel to win. Hillel took a relatively lighter touch once he was elected, authorizing the Shomrim to engage in anti-terrorist actions but restricting local police involvement in such actions. Hillel also had the Ministry of Justice indict and prosecute the Beis LeChem Police Department chief Yoel Tzaddeki for excessive force and murder; a local jury found the police chief innocent and the prosecution caused a national stir in popular opinion against Hillel that fed into his quick resignation during his June 2002 scandal. Hillel, before his resignation, had worked with the left-wing Yisraeli Christian Association to provide more grants and funds to Christian communities and institutions in the Yisraeli north; the effect of his economic aid is debatable but culturally, it lowered the temperature among many Christians who had been feeling embittered over lackluster federal funding of schools and community projects in their neighborhoods.

The early Digital Age Internet took off with Internet message boards where young Yisraeli Christians geared towards radicalism were connected with ASLA handlers and recruiters. The group launched a few scattered attacks between 2003-2008. Joint Shomrim-YeMep raids in 2009 in Chevron and the Christian Quarter in Yerushalayim captured or killed the senior ASLA commanders and lieutenants. Throughout the 2010s, the ASLA's followers decentralized to lone wolf attacks, with occasional shootings or bombings. The last successful attack occurred in 2017. However, Yisraeli security officials have announced defeated plots by ASLA-affiliated fighters in 2020, 2021, and 2023.

Extinct

Christian Defense League

Main articles: 1986 CDL political crisis, Issarson Affair, Assassination of James Ferer, June 2018 Ashkelon terrorist attack, and July 2021 Asdarin prison attempted prison break and riot

The Christian Defense League (abbreviated as the "CDL") was a nondenominational Christian, secular nationalist, and separatist terrorist group. Unlike the Yarden Catholic Front and All-Sydalon Liberation Army, which identified as Sydalene Catholic pan-nationalist organizations seeking to induce part or all of Yisrael to be annexed or otherwise controlled by Sydalon, the CDL was a secularized Christian group of all denominations, including some of Yisrael's Protestant populations as well as secular or lax Fabrian Catholics, who identified more culturally with Sydalon and wished to create an highly-independent autonomous region within Yisrael or seek independence as a separate state encompassing all or parts of the Yarden River Valley.

The Schwartz-Citron era pushed Yisrael more into a conservative, religious, and theocratic direction, which prioritized Yisraeli Jewish priorities, concerns, and people over the country's Christian communities. The defeat of the FYVCF's First Crusade in the 1970s demoralized many separatist and Sydalon-favoring Yisraeli Christians in the 1980s. Johan Issarson, an ethnic Ghantish Protestant Christian who lived in the biblical city of Chevron, was inspired to create an "autonomous zone" in the Christian-heavy north of Yisrael so Christians of all creeds and types could manage most of their own affairs. He was a professor of Christian theology at the Royal College of Chevron. During his lawful political advocacy, he suggested an independent Christian state in the Yarden River Valley that would be in a "compact" or "free association" with Sydalon. His advocacy was, at best, scoffed at and dismissed; at worst, he was declared a "terrorist supporter" and "separatist." By the mid-1980s, he was embittered and turned towards association with extremist Christian voices in his church. He found a cohort of Christians - many of them secular or barely practicing, many of them non-Catholic - who felt neglected or viewed with hostility by Yisraeli society and police. Issarson developed relationships among these types of people and eventually launched a local political party called the "Christian Defense League" in January 1986 which advocated a binding referendum on independence on Yisraeli governance over the Christian-majority areas of the Yarden Special and Northern Districts. The local Yisraeli authorities refused to certify his party as a valid political party and soon after, far-right Yisraeli Jewish thugs ransacked his offices and beat up some of his supporters. Months of lawsuits, tireless advocacy on the ground and through the media, and continuing attacks by violent Jewish extremists and stonewalling local Jewish authorities radicalized Issarson.

In 1987, Issarson went underground and took the name of his intended political party as a "resistance group"; he intended to force a referendum by violence, feeling his legal and political options had run out. A Shomrim analysis in 1989 assessed the CDL had a core membership of 300 fighters and sympathizers in the several thousand. Under Issarson's leadership, the CDL struck mainly government targets: police, civil servants, and politicians. Far-right Jewish groups such as the Northern League and similar offshoots were also targets for the CDL. The CDL focused its energies in areas where it had sympathizers; the Northern District, Yarden Special District, and the Christian Quarter in Yerushalayim. It bombed police stations, government offices, and military facilities. It assassinated politicians, police officers on the beat, and far-right Jewish supporters. It launched a spate of attacks between 1987 and 1995.

Presidents from Michoel Citron onwards refused to negotiate with the group, calling its proposals "delusional," "violations of the Yarden Accords," and "unacceptable." The use of force against Yisrael by group to attempt to achieve its ends was also a reason the proposals were rejected. Over time, Yisraeli security agencies began to tighten the nose around the CDL and its supporters. Checkpoints and transit restrictions going into and out of the Christian Quarter later led to raids that apprehended CDL supporters and removed safe-houses and bases inside the capital from the CDL's control and use.

As the CDL's campaign coincided with the early 1990s attacks by the ASLA and the Yarden Catholic Front's "Second Crusade", anti-terrorist operations ramped up across the board, and the CDL was targeted along with the other three groups in rapid succession. Issarson, who had relocated at some point during the 1990s to Ghant, was found by the Royal Yisraeli Intelligence Service. According to media leaks at the time, the RYIS discovered that Grace Galan, Empress of Ghant, a known Yarden Revisionist and believed secret sympathizer of Christian terrorism in Yisrael, was sheltering the terrorist leader in a private castle in rural Ghant. A RYIS team was alleged to have landed in Ghant and killed Issarson and three high-level associates in a car bomb; another senior lieutenant was found by Ghantish authorities dead with a bullet hole in his forehead in the castle. The assassinations became known as the Issarson Affair and caused a stir in Ghant; however, the Emperor of Ghant and the Conservative Party-led Ghantish government downplayed the killings.

The CDL's activities slackened for several years but revved up again during the Whirlwind Knesset of 2002. Issarson's successor, James Ferer, went further than his mentor and aligned with pro-Sydalon aims, hoping to use the political crisis on the Yisraeli political scene to push for a breakthrough in the group's political aims. The resignation of President Naor Hillel, the rise of his Vice-President, Ariel Halevi, and the unstable party control in the deadlocked Knesset did nothing to give the CDL any progress towards its political goals; Yisraeli politicians categorically denied any change in the Yarden Accords or territorial integrity of Yisrael itself. Ferer was assassinated during a secret meeting of Yarden Revisionists and extremist Christian groups in Garima in 2007.

The group moved closer to the political position of the Yarden Catholic Front as it approached the 2010s; they allied and cooperated with the Yarden Catholic Front on instigating the bloody 2011 Yericho riots. After that event, the CDL launched a scattering of attacks on police officers and Northern League members throughout the 2010s. It launched a successful multifaceted series of attacks on the downtown of the city of Ashkelon in June 2018. Later, like most organizations opposed to the Yisraeli state, it was more successfully infiltrated by Yisraeli security services and most actions in the late 2010s and early 2020s were thwarted before they began.

The last attack of any note, though a failure, was a joint action with the Yarden Catholic Front in the July 2021 Asdarin prison attempted prison break and riot. The Shomrim assessed that organizationally, the CDL had used up the remainder of its strength in that failed attack. It is considered extinct as an organization as all of its known members are dead or in custody.

Yisraeli counter-terrorism

Main articles: Royal Yisraeli Security Service, Royal Yisraeli Special Political Police, and Special units of the Royal Yisraeli Border Guard

See also

• Sydalon-Yisrael relations
• Yarden River Valley
• List of designated terrorist organizations in Ajax