In the past few days, a large police observation Zeppelin has been hovering above the city of Umm el-Fahm and the Arab communities of Wadi Ara on the highway between Hadera and Afula in north-central Israel, Israel hayom reported Monday.
The balloon is on an intelligence gathering mission – surveillance and prevention of criminal activity. It is part of a comprehensive plan formulated by the Israel Police to eradicate criminal and terrorist crime in Wadi Ara, particularly in Umm el-Fahm.
Umm el-Fahm is a blatant example of the growing lawlessness in parts of the Israeli Arab community, which makes up 20 percent of Israel’s population. A terrifying 59% of all murders are committed in Israel by Arabs, according to police.
The government has recently invested in a multi-billion-dollar plan to boost policing in Arab municipalities. And, in view of the fact that a large number of crime cases have taken place recently in Umm el-Fahm and the Wadi Ara communities, by crime families and organized crime, as well as the alarming rise in the activity of the Islamic terrorist organizations and the attempts to recruit and activate Israeli Arab citizens, including residents of Wadi Ara – the police are fully invested in the plan to eradicate criminal and national crime in Umm el-Fahm and the surrounding area.
The plan was formulated by the police to improve the security of the residents of Wadi Ara includes a massive allocation of resources and the reinforcement of forces in the area, including the use of advanced technological intelligence measures and an unprecedented and extensive intelligence deployment of a network of security cameras in Umm el-Fahm and the rest of Wadi Ara.
According to the commander of the Menashe District of Israel Police, Commander Shimon Ben Sahvo, this is a focused activity aimed at preserving the public’s normative security and raising its sense of security, and an uncompromising treatment of the perpetrators of crime.
“We are carrying out extensive intelligence activities, and the Zeppelin is part of a complete intelligence network that includes security cameras and other advanced, undisclosed technological means, and we do not hesitate to use them to expose criminal activity. The Zeppelin is an operational tool that is in the service of the police and helps us in a variety of areas,” Ben Shavo said.
“We are working with large forces in an open and covert way, and the normative citizens who want to live in security provide us with support and support,” the commander continued, concluding, “The residents of Umm el-Fahm and Wadi Ara have the same security as the residents of Caesarea and Afula, for example, and there is no reason why it should not be so.”