| Summarizing the recent unpleasantness. |
Gazooks fired a few rockets at Israel on Friday, but none on Saturday as of press time. IDF sources said that Islamic Jihad
...created after many members of the Egyptian Moslem Brotherhood decided the organization was becoming too moderate. Operations were conducted out of Egypt until 1981 when the group was exiled after the liquidation of President Anwar Sadat. They worked out of Gaza until they were exiled to Lebanon in 1987, where they clove tightly to Hezbollah. In 1989 they moved to Damascus, where they remain a subsidiary of Hezbollah...
was severely beaten in the recent round of violence and that it would need time to rebuild its capabilities.
The air force bombed more than 40 targets throughout the Gazoo Strip over the past week, including nearly 20 rocket squads, and several weapons storage centers and underground long-range rocket launchers.
On Friday, one of the Kassam rockets hit in the Eshkol regional. No one was maimed.
After a week when many schools in the South were closed, all classes were expected to return to normal on Sunday.
"Islamic Jihad was hit hard in the recent round of violence but the rocket fire continued since it needs to be able to have the last word," a senior IDF source said over the weekend.
On the other hand, the source said that the IDF was impressed by Islamic Jihad's ability to fire more than 300 rockets during the main five days of hostilities, even though a significant number hit in Gazoo
| Something like a third did not hit Israel, though where they landed is not clear... |
The IDF source said that by last Tuesday, Islamic Jihad was "begging" Egypt to convince Israel to accept a ceasefire.
The source also said that Israel was satisfied with Egypt's role in brokering the truce, an indication that Cairo still had influence in the Gazoo Strip.
The IDF believes that Islamic Jihad refrained from firing its long-range Iranian-supplied Fajr-5 artillery rockets that have the capability to hit Tel Aviv.
Meanwhile on Friday, IDF Spokesman Brig.-Gen. Yoav Mordechai accused Tehran of "pulling the strings" behind the rocket fire against Israel from the Gazoo Strip. As reported last week in The Jerusalem Post, IDF Military Intelligence said that Iran was actively encouraging Islamic Jihad to continue and even escalate its rocket attacks against Israel.
"The regime of ayatollahs in Iran continues to operate proxies in Leb and Gazoo and to support them with weapons and funds," Mordechai wrote on his Facebook wall. Next to the comment, Mordechai has posted a cartoon of Iran's diminutive President
Mahmoud Short RoundAhmadinejad holding puppets of Hezbullies leader Hassan Nasrallah and Hamas, always the voice of sweet reason, Prime Minister Ismail Haniyeh
...became Prime Minister after the legislative elections of 2006 which Hamas won. President Mahmoud Abbas dismissed Haniyeh from office on 14 June 2007 at the height of the Fatah-Hamas festivities, but Haniyeh did not acknowledge the decree and continues as the PM of Gazoo while Abbas maintains a separate PM in the West Bank...
.