Israel Strikes Gaza As Kassams Hit Negev

Bottom line: Hamas appears determined to draw Israel in, going so far as to threaten a renewal of suicide bombing attacks while continuing to launch Kassams. Israel is trying to not give Hamas leverage to unite the Palestinians on a war footing. They've allowed 500 Fatah troops trained in Egypt into Gaza to deal with Hamas while undertaking an air strike on one building over night themselves.

The tanks that rolled about a mile into Gaza yesterday are dug in and no significant military build up by Israel is being reported beyond that. Abbas canceled a visit to Gaza due to concerns his convoy would be attacked. Israel looks to be trying to support Fatah enough for them to prevail, without doing too much and getting caught up on a larger scale. They aren't getting much help from the MSM, including the New York Times, who seems to want to portray it as a looming war. But later reports from the Middle-East don't support that, at least, not yet.

Five Hamas fighters were killed in an Israeli air strike overnight, taking the death toll among the Palestinian movement to 10 in the hours since Israel vowed to hit back for Hamas rocket strikes.

JERUSALEM — Israel this week allowed the Palestinian Fatah movement to bring into the Gaza Strip as many as 500 fresh troops trained under a U.S.-coordinated program to counter Hamas, the militant Islamic group that won Palestinian parliamentary elections last year. Fighting between the rivals has left about 45 Palestinians dead since Sunday.

Residents of Sderot and the west Negev woke up to another day of Qassam attacks Friday.

A rocket hit a Sderot gas station at around 9:30 am, lightly wounding one person. Two more people suffered shock. A second rocket hit a house in the town and caused structural damages.

The first salvo started shortly after 7 am, when Palestinians in north Gaza launched three rockets towards the Israeli community. The Color Red alert system sounded ahead of the attacks.

JERUSALEM — The Middle East was on the verge of war last night after Hamas threatened to renew suicide bombing on Israel. It did so after Israel launched air and ground attacks on the Gaza Strip.

"All options are open, including martyrdom operations [suicide attacks]," Abu Obeida, a spokesman for the military wing of Hamas, said.

Israeli F-16 warplanes bombed the headquarters of the Hamas-established Executive Security Force in Gaza City, as sporadic factional clashes between the rival Palestinian Hamas and Fatah persisted yesterday throughout the Strip despite a new truce.

At least 15 people were injured in the air strike on the building in the centre of the city, Hamas sources said, adding that four of them were Executive Force members. The others were bystanders.

Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas canceled a planned visit to the Gaza Strip on Thursday for fear that Hamas militiamen might attack his convoy, PA officials here said. 

Comments

[seekeronos]

When will Israel learn? It cannot expect to have peace with an enemy population within its borders. She should push the so-called "Palestinian" Arabs off of her land and resettle more Jewish immigrants into the "disputed" territories. The Arabs have had nearly 50 years to learn to assimiliate peacefully, but have refused to do so.

Therefore, Israel should evict those intractable people from within her land.

[southdakotaboy]

Every time Hamas shoots rockets into Israel from Gaza, Israel should just stop all moement into and out of Gaza( that includes food).

[Purple Avenger]

Hamas, as a governing body, has jumped the shark.

[southdakotaboy]

Hamas hit a school and not much was said on the msm about it. Now I know no one was killed at that school, but several students had to be hospitalised for shock. Now if Israel had done something like that the denounceations would have been so thick you could have walked on them. I'm sure some of our resident lefties will be quick to defend the Palis but I'm just sick of hearing it.

[Fred Beloit]

It must be terribly difficult to be an Israeli, especially with a family to worry about. It is hard to understand how they can take this punishment year after year after year without doing something really drastic to try to end it.

[Leatherneck]

The Arabs send over a hundred rockets into Israel, but you can only fine out about it on the Internet. As soon as Israel strikes back, presto, it is all over the news.

The MSM new world order types do not like problems with oil flow, or morality. Therefore, Israel is made out to be the bad guy.