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Three Islamic Jihad militants were killed yesterday in an Israel Air Force strike on the northern Gaza Strip while attempting to fire rockets into Israel, and another Palestinian was seriously injured in the strike.

Ten Palestinians have been killed in Israeli strikes in the past two weeks, which have seen dozens of rockets and mortar shells launched at Israel.
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Despite the apparent escalation of violence, Israel Defense Forces officials said Hamas is not interested in a broader confrontation with Israel, and predict calm will soon return to the Gaza border.

Israeli aircraft struck the militant cell around 7 P.M. last night. IDF officials told Haaretz the Jihad operatives were spotted while setting up rocket launchers east of the city of Dir al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip.

One of the men killed was Awad Nasir, a 29-year-old resident of the city who was a senior commander of the Al-Quds Brigades, Islamic Jihad's armed wing. It is possible the cell Nasir headed was operating independently, without direct orders from the organization's leadership.

Hassan al-Qatarawi, 22, of Bureij refugee camp, and Hudhaifa al-Hams, 23, of Nuseirat refugee camp, both aides of Nasir, were also killed in the strike.

Several high-ranking IDF officers said they do not think Hamas is behind the recent rocket and mortar fire, although last week the Islamist group did downgrade efforts to prevent smaller, more radical factions from launching projectiles into Israel.

The officers said Hamas' decision to loosen its reins over smaller factions in Gaza may be an attempt to allow them to express their anger at the Israeli strikes and at Egypt's plan to erect a wall between Egypt and Gaza. Hamas and the smaller factions are worried that the barrier will severely limit Gazans' ability to smuggle weapons and other goods into the Strip.

The IDF officers said it was difficult to predict the next phase of Israel's conflict with Hamas.

"We've seen in the past how confrontations have developed even if the major power holders have no interest in them," said one. "Hamas must know that Israel will respond to any aggression against it, and that if necessary, will know how to exact a price from the landlords in the Strip - the group's leadership."

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at a cabinet meeting yesterday that the IDF is striking rocket manufacturing facilities in Gaza, as well as the smuggling tunnels by which Iranian weapons are reaching the territory. "The government's policy is clear: Every rocket on our soil will be met with force," he said.

Hamas sought to play down yesterday's air strike, giving it minimal space on its official Web site. However, a Hamas parliamentarian, Mushir al-Masri, said the strike showed Israel was seeking an escalation with the group, and that a Palestinian response was only a matter of time.

"The resistance will choose the time and place" for such a response, Masri said. "The Palestinian people will protect itself with all means and methods at its disposal."

Palestinian medical sources said yesterday that two other Palestinians had been killed in an IDF strike in the northern Gaza Strip, a statement the army denied.
source-haaretz.com

The Iron Dome short-range missile defense system passed a series of tests over the last few days with flying colors, successfully shooting down Qassam rockets, Grad rockets and mortar shells one after the other.

It even succeeded in determining which missiles to shoot down - those whose trajectory made them likely to land in a populated area - and which to ignore.

This was the first test of the system as a whole rather than individual components.
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The results are a feather in the cap of the developer, Rafael Advanced Defense Systems, which succeeded in transforming the highly complex system from an idea into an almost fully operational product in just two and a half years. The first operational battery is expected to be deployed in May.

Credit also goes to Defense Minister Ehud Barak and his ministry's outgoing director general, Pinchas Buchris, for pushing the project.

It is hard to exaggerate the importance of the successful tests. Iron Dome is supposed to provide protection against missiles with a range of between four and 70 kilometers. That covers everything from mortar shells through Hamas' Qassams, Hezbollah's Katyusha rockets and even Iranian Fajr rockets, which have apparently made their way to the Gaza Strip. As such, it radically improves Israel's strategic position.

Nevertheless, protection of Israel's home front remains far from complete. First, Iron Dome has yet to be tested in a genuine attack. Second, Israel still lacks any additional missile batteries beyond the prototype just tested. Third, the intermediate layer of Israel's missile defense system - Magic Wand, which is supposed to handle missiles with longer ranges than those covered by Iron Dome but shorter than the long-range ballistic missiles covered by the Arrow - has yet to reach a similarly advanced stage of development, and is not expected to do so until 2012.

The first Iron Dome battery will be delivered to the air force in about six weeks and is slated, if all goes well, to become operational in May. A single missile battery is enough to protect a medium-sized city like Sderot.

The question is how many batteries the Israel Defense Forces will ultimately acquire, and when. It would take about 20 batteries, each costing some NIS 50 million, to defend the entire northern and southern border regions. That will require either diverting substantial funds from other defense projects or significantly increasing the defense budget.

Rafael is expected to profit handsomely, both from sales to the IDF and, later, overseas. The United States, for instance, might want to purchase the missile protection system to defend its army bases in the Middle East against terror attacks.

Will Iron Dome make Israel more likely to launch another war in Gaza? It may do just the opposite, by increasing Israel's deterrence against Hamas, thereby stabilizing the situation. If Hamas knows its ability to harm Israel has been substantially reduced, it may be less likely to engage in provocations.

However, the Palestinians will almost certainly put the system to the test, if only in the hope of scoring a symbolic victory by breaking through Israel's technological shield.

But for all the praise this achievement deserves, one criticism must be leveled: It should have happened much sooner. For years, the IDF refused to invest the necessary funds in developing Iron Dome, until former defense minister Amir Peretz finally forced it to do so. Had this been done sooner, not only would Israeli lives have been saved, but it might have been possible to avoid last winter's war in Gaza altogether and significantly reduce the damage from the Second Lebanon War in 2006.
 SOURCE-http://www.haaretz.com

GAZA, Jan. 4 (Xinhua) -- Israel has reduced commercial crossings with Gaza to three, closing a subsidiary passage through which fuel was piped into the blocked Gaza Strip, a Palestinian official said on Monday.     "Israel told us that Nahal Ozz crossing in eastern Gaza City will be shut down forever," said Ra'ed Fatouh, an official with the Palestinian Economy Ministry.
    From now on, cooking gas, gasoline and diesel will be sent to Gaza through Kerem Shalom crossing in southeast Gaza Strip, he added.
    Gaza people fear that they would suffer from gas shortage during the period when Israel moves the depots to the new crossing. They also warn that the Kerem Shalom crossing is not qualified to deliver enough amounts of fuel.
    Israel has been imposing a tight blockade on the Gaza Strip since the capture of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit by Hamas-led Gazan militants in a cross-border raid in June 2006.
    Israel and Egypt sealed off their borders with Gaza in June 2007 when Islamic Hamas movement took over Gaza from security forces loyal to the Western-backed President Mahmoud Abbas.
sourcehttp://news.xinhuanet.com