Israeli officials, frustrated over continuing rocket attacks from Gaza and continued weapons smuggling by Hamas, are threatening to expand ongoing security operations into a full-fledged invasion. Avi Dichter, Israel's former head of Shin Bet and current Minister of Internal Security, blamed Hamas for the rocket attacks, saying they had "authorized" other organizations, including the al-Aqsa Brigades to attack by proxy.
Israel began expanding its operations in Gaza earlier this week by taking control of a key road along the Egypt-Gaza border, where the IDF discovered 13 weapons-smuggling tunnels, which were blown up to prevent further use. Tons of explosives, sniper rifles, Grad rockets and dozens of Russian-made anti-tank missiles similar to the ones used by Hezbollah have been smuggled through the tunnels and into Gaza in recent months.
"Israel is not going to count its fatalities," Dichter told reporters in Washington. "Those areas in the Gaza Strip that, from there they are launching Qassam rockets, will be under Israeli attacks, and if it's needed, invasion… If it will be needed, we know exactly how to invade the specific part of Gaza, and to foil it. And the depth of our invasion is going to be decided by the distance of the Qassam rockets."
Israel has also charged that Iran was funding, along with Syria, the rearming of Hezbollah in Lebanon. "Whether it's from Iran, through Damascus, through Syria, into Lebanon, or from Syria itself to Lebanon, the minute we'll be able to confirm this kind of information, it's going to be treated according to the 1701 agreement," Dichter said, "because then it demands sanctions against countries… who are supplying Hezbollah or any other organizations in Lebanon with all kinds of weapons."
The bad guys always interpret the tolerance the patience and the forgiveness of democracies as weaknesses, and they mustn't be allowed to any longer. In other words, why on earth has Isreal waited so long to deal with this problem with finality?!?!?
Posted by: Garduneh Mehr | Oct 20, 2006 at 14:50