Ceasefire rocked by rockets from Gaza
The relative calm on the Israel-Gaza border was broken this week, when Palestinian militants fired five rockets towards Israel.
Two of the rockets were intercepted by the Iron Dome missile defence system, but the other three landed in southern Israel.
While they fell in open areas and didn’t cause injuries, the rockets raised the question of how long the current lull in terrorist activity over the border will last. Operation Pillar of Defence late last year mostly put a stop to rocket attacks.
Some Israeli politicians view the latest breach seriously. “Israel should consider recapturing the Gaza Strip,” Avigdor Lieberman, leader of Yisrael Beitenu and chairman of the Knesset’s Foreign Affairs and Defence Committee, told a radio interviewer on Monday. He advocated a “serious clean-up” by Israel in Gaza.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was not drawn into any discussion about Lieberman’s comment, and spoke only of his policy, which is to “harm anyone who tries to harm us”, and his determination to respond promptly to attacks.
Israel’s Air Force quickly retaliated for the rocket attacks, striking terrorist infrastructure including two weapon storage facilities in the central Gaza Strip and a rocket launch site in the southern Gaza Strip. The strikes were believed to be accurate.
“Our retaliation is not against people but against infrastructure,” military spokesperson Arye Shalicar told The AJN.
Though the attacks on southern Israel are thought to be the work of Islamic Jihad, Israel blames the rival Islamist movement Hamas, as it governs Gaza. “Hamas is held accountable for all acts of terrorism deriving from the Gaza Strip,” commented head of the IDF’s foreign press branch Peter Lerner, who said that the attacks constituted “an intolerable act of aggression against Israel and its civilians”.
Violence this week wasn’t limited to Gaza. Gunshots were fired at an Israeli driver in the West Bank, near Nablus, on Tuesday. There were no injuries.
The prognosis for the West Bank over the coming months, like that for the Gaza border, is unclear. Nitzan Alon, a senior military commander in the West Bank, said last week that if the peacemaking efforts of US Secretary of State John Kerry don’t succeed, “I’m afraid we will see the escalation … strengthen”.
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