WarSclerotic

Avigdor Liberman: IDF counterattack a “wimpy response”

via Avigdor Liberman: IDF counterattack a “wimpy response” – Israel News – Jerusalem Post.

All they did was throw four bombs at sand,” Yisrael Beytenu chairman tells Army Radio.

Yisrael Beytenu chairman Avgidor Liberman called the IDF’s counterattack to a Gazan rocket  “a wimpy response of a faux government.” Liberman, along with a number of opposition MKs, had mixed reactions to the Israel’s response.”All they did was throw four bombs at sand,” Liberman told Army Radio on Wednesday. “The is a government that does not get in the way of terrorist organizations rehabilitating their terrorist infrastructure.”

He recounted that, during coalition talks, he demanded that the government’s guidelines stated that they plan to eradicate Hamas rule from Gaza, “but it was clear that Likud has no intention of setting that goal or realizing it. That’s part of the reasons we are not part of the government.”

Immigration and Absorption Minister Ze’ev Elkin responded that for six years, while Liberman was foreign minister, the policy was to respond every time a rocket was shot from Gaza, and that policy continues.

MK Omer Bar-Lev (Zionist Union) also called the IDF response “minor, to say the least.”

“Israel does not have a policy in connection to the conflict in the south. [Netanyahu] does not have a vision or a plan and apparently not the will to bring a diplomatic process and international intervention that will bring any change in the ritual in which we have been trapped for 14 years,” he added.

Meretz chairwoman Zehava Gal-On warned that the IDF bombing was too strong a response. Gal-On called on Netanyahu to “take a deep breath and don’t be dragged after politicians who want to bring us back to Operation Protective Edge, bring Hamas’s collapse and deteriorate us into another escalation.

“It’s true that a rocket launched at Gan Yavne that puts people in shelters is intolerable, but responding with bombs and force will not prevent the next round [of fighting]. We already saw it doesn’t work,” she added.

Instead, Gal-On suggested that the government offer incentives that will reduce Gazans’ motivation to commit acts of terrorism, as part of a comprehensive agreement with the Palestinians and with the Arab League’s cooperation.

After rocket attack, Israeli jets strike targets in Gaza Strip | The Times of Israel.

No reports of casualties in early morning strikes on Islamic Jihad; defense minister says Israel won’t tolerate renewed hostilities

The Israeli Air Force launched airstrikes on the Gaza Strip early Wednesday morning, hours after a projectile fired from the coastal enclave fell in southern Israel, causing no damage.

There were no immediate reports of casualties in the bombardments across the Palestinian coastal enclave.

The IDF said in a statement that it targeted four sites of terror infrastructure in the southern Gaza Strip in response to the rocket fire at southern Israel on Tuesday evening. The military said it confirmed direct hits.

“The reality that Hamas’s territory is used as a staging ground to attack Israel is unacceptable and intolerable and will bear consequences,” military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Peter Lerner said in a statement.

The planes targeted training camps belonging to the Islamic Jihad in Rafah, Khan Yunis and Gaza City, the witnesses said.

A video posted on Facebook claimed to show footage of one of the Israeli airstrikes on the northern Gaza Strip.

A Hamas official said the group was working to calm the situation with rival Palestinian groups in the Gaza Strip, Israel Radio reported.

Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon said Wednesday morning that Israel wouldn’t tolerate a return to regular rocket fire from the Gaza Strip, adding that if calm doesn’t return to the south the residents of Gaza would pay a heavy price. He said Israel holds Hamas responsible for all hostilities toward Israel from the Gaza Strip.

Although Hamas did not take credit for the rocket fire, and sources in the Gaza Strip said the rocket was likely fired by members of the Islamic Jihad, Israel had maintained that it holds the governing terror group responsible for all attacks emanating from the Gaza Strip.

A rocket fired from the Gaza Strip hit southern Israel on Tuesday night, shortly after 9 p.m. as alarms sounded across the region, the Israeli army said.

There were no immediate reports of injuries or damage from the rocket, which landed near the town of Gan Yavne, outside Ashdod, according to an IDF statement.

The projectile — a Grad missile — was located minutes after sirens sounded in the Lachish region and Ashdod.

Many residents of southern Israel reported hearing multiple blasts.

However, an Israeli official said Jerusalem holds Hamas responsible for all attacks launched from the enclave, and the group was reportedly evacuating buildings and bases Tuesday night ahead of an expected Israeli retaliation.

A source in Gaza said the firing was the result of an internal dispute inside the Islamic Jihad terror group, which has included kidnappings of people in northern Gaza.

The source said Islamic Jihad recently appointed a new commander to oversee the northern region of the coastal enclave.

The new commander was supposed to start his new position today officially, but his predecessor opposed it, sparking clashes between the two commanders’ supporters.

The new commander’s men then kidnapped two operatives working under the former commander and, in retaliation, the predecessor’s followers decided to fire rockets at Israel.

Hamas security forces are now searching the area from which the rockets were launched and have detained several suspects, according to the source.

According to the Ynet news website, the attack marked the first time a Grad rocket, which can go farther than the smaller Kassams more commonly shot out of Gaza, had been fired at Israel since the summer war.

In response to the rocket fire, Yisrael Beytenu party head Avigdor Liberman said the current government must commit to toppling Hamas rule in the Gaza Strip, or risk appearing “weak.”

“A government that is not willing to write as part of its guidelines that it intends to destroy the Hamas regime in Gaza is a government that displays weakness,” said the former foreign minister, who had pushed to retake the Gaza Strip during the summer operation. “If it does not pull itself together now it might as well end its rule now, immediately after it began, for the benefit of the citizens of Israel and the strength of the state.”

Likud’s Miri Regev also maintained Hamas was responsible for the rocket fire.

“It’s too bad Hamas is trying to deteriorate the security situation in the south,” she said. “Israel must respond to every [rocket] attack on the citizens of Israel.”

Since Israel and Hamas reached a ceasefire in August 2014 — which put a halt to the 50-day war in Gaza — the IDF has reported on numerous instances of weapons tests within the Gaza Strip, some of which triggered false alarms in Israel’s southern communities around the coastal enclave.

There have also been several cases of isolated rocket fire from the Strip apparently directed at Israel.

The last barrage took place on April 23, as Israel’s Independence Day celebrations came to a close.

Israel is wary of Gaza terrorist groups rearming after Operation Protective Edge. The IDF says Hamas has been conducting test launches in recent months, in order to increase its rocket-launching capabilities.

AFP, Itamar Sharon and Avi Issacharoff contributed to this report.