Gaza Boiling Again
Ever since Samson wrangled with the Philistines, Gaza has been a hotbed of death and mayhem. Would that there would be peace for all the people in that region, but so long as Hamas and the PLO are in charge, misery will follow.
Modern Gaza has been a thorn in the side of not only Israel, but Egypt as well. The area with the sea as its border on the west has been used as a training ground for terrorism launched against Israel.
When the “Palestinians” were being invented as a propaganda tool against Israel, in the 1960s, mass immigration from Arab countries was key. By 1951, after the War of Independence, Gaza had only around 80,000 “natives” but today there are more than a million!
In the book Gideon’s Spies, we learn how the resources flow today:
“The money comes from Iran. It is laundered through the central banks from Damascus to Athens. From there it is electronically transferred to an account in Cairo. Then it is couriered to Gaza City for distribution by the Jihad Committee.”
On Monday of this week, the Israelis arrested a senior official with Islamic Jihad, Bassam al-Sa’adi. According to a report with the JNS:
“Khaled al-Batsh, head of the politburo of PIJ in Gaza, said on Wednesday: ‘We have every right to bomb Israel with our most advanced weapons and make the occupier pay a heavy price. We will not settle for attacking around Gaza, but we will bomb the center of the so-called State of Israel,’ according to The Media Line.”
Well, today, Islamic Jihad fired 100 rockets from Gaza into Israel.
This came after a senior terrorist with Islamic Jihad was killed in an IDF airstrike. Operation Breaking Dawn achieved a good degree of success for the Israelis including the elimination of terrorist leader Tayseer al-Jabari.”
Remember, “caretaker” PM Yair Lapid is running the show (he has the support of Benjamin Netanyahu), along with Defense Minister Benny Gantz. The operation was launched after intel confirmed a major terror attack was in the offing.
Gantz has called up 25,000 reservists after Jabari was suspected of masterminding an attack.
A report also this week from the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center gives some insight into just how the terrorists have contempt even for their own people, often using them as shields and cannon fodder:
“On July 27, 2022, the IDF published a list of Hamas terrorist sites in the Gaza Strip operating in the heart of the civilian population and near civilian facilities. One of them was a terrorist tunnel discovered during Operation Guardian of the Walls. The tunnel shaft is near the Islamic University in Gaza City, which has about 20,000 students, and the tunnel path runs close to UNRWA’s main offices. Another was a site for manufacturing and repairing weapons, located in a residential building about 55 meters (about 60 feet) from UNRWA’s clinics and the Shifaa Hospital. There were also a terrorist tunnel in the al-Tufah neighborhood of Gaza City, whose path runs near an elementary school which serves as an emergency civilian shelter, and a weapons storehouse inside a mosque where activities for children and adolescents take place; the mosque is in the heart of a civilian neighborhood (IDF spokesman, July 27, 2022).”
For a long time now, Gaza has been fairly unpredictable with regard to rocket attacks. When Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon decided in 2005 to pull out of Gaza, it was seen as a goodwill gesture by the West. In fact, one could argue it was a strategic mistake, since Hamas filled the leadership vacuum.
It appears Israel’s intention is simply to maintain relative stability. They know that they periodically will have to go in and put down Hamas, but for now, the terrorists can’t come close to matching IDF capabilities.
That is true, but what a sad reality to watch citizens be killed by their own Arab leadership. “Cleaning-out” Gaza would be a monumental operation. So for now it remains “merely” a powder keg.