Islamic Jihad
Islamic JihadIsrael news photo: Flash 90

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu has pointed the finger at Iran in ongoing rocket attacks from Gaza. “The fire from Gaza is an Iranian problem, not a Palestinian problem,” he said Sunday in a meeting of Likud ministers.

Iran has been accused of funding Islamic Jihad, one of the main terrorist groups operating in Gaza, Judea and Samaria and the group behind many of the recent rocket attacks.

IDF spokesman, Brigadier-General Yoav Mordechai, leveled similar accusations. “Islamic Jihad continues to act as the long arm of Iran, which finances, supports, and encourages it even today with weapons and money that come straight from Tehran,” he said.

Hamas has, so far, distanced itself from direct rocket attacks, defense officials said Sunday, but allows attacks to continue unimpeded. Ministers warned that they would hold Hamas responsible for all terrorism perpetrated from Gaza whether or not its members carried out the actual attack.

The IDF has succeeded in dealing a blow to the terrorist infrastructure of Hamas as well as that of other terrorist groups in Gaza, Mordechai said. Assassinations targeting Islamic Jihad have weakened that group’s leadership as well, he noted.