WarSclerotic

Iranian hackers in recent months broke into the personal phone of Benny Gantz, a leading candidate in next month’s elections, and obtained its entire contents, according to a report Thursday.

Two senior Shin Bet security service officials approached the Blue and White party chairman last month to inform him that his cellular phone had been hacked shortly after he announced his political bid, with programmers in Iran getting hold of his personal details and texts, Channel 12 news reported.

The Shin Bet agents noted to Gantz that any sensitive info could be used against him in the future and told him to proceed as he sees fit.

Channel 12 noted that no classified information is likely to have been on the device.

In light of the Channel 12 report, Gantz canceled a series of campaign appearances in bars scheduled for Thursday evening.

Blue and White declined to comment on the details of the report, saying that its timing weeks before the election “raises questions.”

Illustrative: A smart phone with a warning of a hacking attack. (iStock from Getty Images/ CarmenMurillo)

“We do not comment on issues pertaining to the core of Israeli security… the incident occurred four years after Gantz ended his [military] service. The timing of the publication raises questions,” the party said in a statement.

The report came amid concerns of foreign election meddling and cyber-attacks affecting the democratic process and the campaigns.

The head of the Shin Bet warned recently that a foreign nation was planning to meddle with the vote. Russia has since said it had no intention of doing so.

The National Cyber Directorate has been working closely with the country’s pollsters and political parties to help them stave off efforts to manipulate the results of the April 9 elections.

View of the Central Elections Committee at the Knesset, March 6, 2019. (Noam Revkin Fenton/Flash90)

Officials in the directorate, which operates under the Prime Minister’s Office, met with representatives of polling companies a few weeks ago, and more recently with major political parties, in a bid to help them prevent hacking into their computer systems. Officials fear hackers could attempt to skew poll results or leak parties’ politically compromising information ahead of the vote, Israel Radio reported on Sunday.

A second round of cyber-defense consultations is planned for political parties.

Cyber officials say a key concern includes the publicizing of leaked emails and documents close to election day geared to damage a particular political party, the report said.

That would be similar to the leaks of emails from the Emmanuel Macron campaign in France that sought to derail his electoral campaign just a day before the vote.

It also recalls the Wikileaks hacking efforts targeting the Hillary Clinton presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee in 2016, which US intelligence officials have blamed on Russia.

The report comes a week after a similar report by the public broadcaster Kan noting the cyber directorate’s preparations for expected hacking attacks on or near election day.

Israeli war planes hit over 100 Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip in a night of strikes  after two rockets were fired at Tel Aviv for the first time since the 2014 war, the IDF said.

The strikes came after an urgent late night consultation between Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and his defense chiefs in Tel Aviv.  “Decisions were taken,” an Israeli official said without elaborating.

Shortly after the strikes began the IDF issued a statement saying the “Hamas terror group carried out the rocket fire.” Hamas has denied it was behind the move.

On Friday morning, IDF spokesperson Ronen Manelis said that over 100 Hamas targets were hit in response to the fire on Tel Aviv. Air strikes went on through out the night.

Israel Radio said the site was a base belonging to Hamas naval commandos.

Palestinian media also reported multiple strikes on Gaza City and at a target in Beit Lahiya in northern Gaza.

The Hamas-run health ministry said there were no immediate reports of casualties.

Warning sirens went off three times during the night in Israeli communities near Gaza with Palestinians firing five projectiles at Israel.

The army said three were intercepted by the Iron Dome System and one failed to clear the border. The fifth apparently fell in an open field. There were no reports of injuries or damage.

An explosion caused by Israeli airstrikes is seen on Gaza City, early Friday, March 15, 2019. Israeli warplanes attacked targets in the southern Gaza Strip early Friday in response to a rare rocket attack on the Israeli city of Tel Aviv (AP Photo/Adel Hana)

The Israeli strikes on the Hamas-run Strip came after rocket fire from Gaza at Tel Aviv. Sirens were triggered Thursday evening in central Israel, as two rockets from Gaza were fired at the heart of the country for the first time since a major conflict in 2014, signaling a possible dramatic escalation of violence by terror groups in the Strip just weeks before the Knesset elections.

Residents of Israel’s second-largest city and the surrounding metropolis of Gush Dan rushed to bomb shelters and reported hearing explosions. The rockets both hit open areas, and did not cause casualties. Five people were treated for shock by paramedics.

Screen capture from video showing the Tel Aviv skyline on March 14 as rocket warning sirens blare after the launch of two rockets from the Gaza Strip (IDF)

Initial reports indicated that the Iron Dome missile defense system was launched to intercept one of the incoming rockets. However, the Israel Defense Force later said no interception had taken place, and it was not clear whether an interceptor had been launched.

“Two rockets were launched from the Gaza Strip towards Israeli territory. The alert and warning systems operated as required,” the army said. “No interceptions were made by aerial defense systems. No damage or injuries were reported. There are no special instructions for the civilian home front.”

A video purportedly showing an Iron Dome launch which made the roundson social media may have been an old clip from 2014.

People standing outside a bomb shelter after it was opened by the Tel Aviv municipality on March 14, 2019, after earlier two rockets from the Gaza Strip were fired toward central Israel. (Adam Shuldman/Flash90)

It wasn’t immediately clear which group in Gaza was responsible for the surprise rocket fire, which occurred on the eve of weekly Hamas-spurred Friday mass rallies and riots along the Strip’s border.

A Hamas official told the The Times of Israel that the terror group “has no interest in an escalation” with Israel. The official said he had “no idea” who fired rockets toward Tel Aviv.

The Hamas-run Interior Ministry called the rocket fire “outside the national consensus” and said it would exact measures against those behind it.

A senior Israeli official told Channel 13 news that Israel indeed did not believe Hamas was behind the attack, but rather another “organization attempting to sabotage efforts to achieve calm in recent days.”

Initial reports had indicated that the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) terror group was responsible for the rocket fire. Hebrew-language media reported that Fajr missiles were launched, which PIJ has in its arsenal.

However, that terror group also denied that it was behind the fire. PIJ spokesman Daoud Shehab called the reports “baseless lies and claims.”

Hamas and PIJ told Egyptian security officials who were in the Strip to discuss a long-term truce that they were not responsible for the rockets, Al-Jazeera reported.

The Home Front Command did not give any special instructions to Israelis and said they could continue to carry on as normal. Tel Aviv Mayor Ron Huldai urged the public to remain calm, but added that public bomb shelters would be opened shortly.

All emergency response organizations in the Tel Aviv area increased their alertness following the incident.

Palestinian media reported that Hamas was evacuating military posts in Gaza in preparation for the Israeli response to the rockets. It also reported that the Egyptian delegation had left Gaza quickly after being instructed to evacuate by the IDF. There was no confirmation of the unsourced reports.

Israeli soldiers stand near a battery of the Iron Dome missile defense system deployed in Tel Aviv on January 24, 2019. (Menahem Kahana/AFP)

The missile launches come less than a month before the April 9 Knesset elections, and two months before Tel Aviv is due to host the Eurovision Song Contest, a major international event that is expected to draw many thousands of tourists from all over Europe.

It was the first time rockets were fired at Tel Aviv since Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014, though launches directed at residents of Israeli communities near Gaza have remain relatively frequent. A rocket fired from Gaza last October fell out at sea across from the greater Tel Aviv area.

Michael Bachner, Judah Ari Gross and agencies contributed to this report.