Israel’s security forces are bracing for the possibility of a flare-up with Gaza after repeated rocket fire from the Palestinian enclave over the past week.
Channel 12 news reported on Saturday that the military is poised to resume retaliatory strikes or even launch a broader operation if Israel’s decision to close its pedestrian crossing with Gaza fails to stem rocket attacks.
According to the uncredited report, the military is preparing for the possibility that the situation could escalate into a multi-day battle between Israel and the Gaza Strip.
Israel avoided responding militarily to three rockets fired from the Hamas-led coastal enclave in southern Israel late Friday — despite conducting multiple attacks this week in response to similar attacks — opting instead to launch its single one Pedestrian crossing with the Gaza Strip, the Gaza Strip to temporarily close Erez Junction.
As Palestinian workers employed in Israel bring millions of shekels into the enclave every day, Jerusalem hopes economic pressures will persuade Hamas to crack down on rocket launches it believes are being carried out by other groups in Gaza.
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“No one rules out the possibility [rocket] kicks off tonight, but the IDF is poised for all sorts of scenarios, from a pinpoint response to a broader offensive,” unnamed security officials told news site Walla. “Nobody wants that on the Israeli side, but there is no intention to stand aside and wait for peace to return.”
The border crossing will not reopen to Palestinian workers on Sunday, according to the military’s liaison with the Palestinians. It has been closed since Thursday afternoon due to the Passover holiday.
“The reopening of the border crossing will be decided in accordance with an assessment of the security situation,” the Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories, known by his acronym COGAT, said in a statement.
Exceptions are made for humanitarian and other outstanding cases, but require approval from COGAT.
The number of Palestinians in Gaza who can work in Israel was increased to 12,000 last month, and the government announced it would increase it by another 8,000, bringing the total to 20,000.
Palestinian workers are seen at the Erez border crossing in the northern Gaza Strip while waiting to enter Israel for work March 13, 2022. (Attia Muhammad/Flash90)
Two missiles were fired from the Strip on Friday night. One landed in an open field in the Sha’ar Hanegev regional council and did no harm, while the second came up short, according to the military in northern Gaza. Hours later, a third rocket was fired from southern Gaza and landed in an open area near a town near the border.
Earlier in the week, a rocket fired from Gaza fell in the area on Thursday, one landed near a house in the town of Sderot on Wednesday and another was shot down by air defenses on Monday.
None of the Gaza-based terrorist groups have directly claimed responsibility for the rocket fire, although several media reports have blamed Monday’s attack on Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
Hamas spokesman Hazem Wassem said the closure of the Erez crossing “is aimed at increasing the siege and is a form of aggression that we cannot accept.”
“That won’t work. The policy of collective punishment of the Palestinians has always proved a failure,” he told The Associated Press.
Muhammad al-Hindi, head of the PIJ’s political bureau, condemned the closure of the crossing and accused Israel of “trying to isolate Gaza from the occupation’s crimes in Jenin and Jerusalem.”
Criticism of the move was also voiced by residents of Israel’s border communities, who expressed anger at the decision not to respond more aggressively to Friday night’s rocket fire, opting instead to impose only civilian sanctions.
A missile from Israel’s Iron Dome air defense system lights up the skies over the Gaza Strip on April 21, 2022. (Said Khatib/AFP)
“It doesn’t surprise us,” Albert Gabay, a resident of Sderot, told Walla on Saturday. “I’m not only worried about Sderot, but about everything that’s happening across the country these days. If you don’t respond, the deterrent is corrupted. Now the deterrence is gone. They had to react to stop the shooting from continuing.”
Gabay blamed the government’s domestic policies and a desire not to anger the coalition’s Islamist Ra’am Party for these policies.
Merav Cohen, who lives in Kibbutz Ein HaShlosha, said that despite the rather minor damage caused by the rocket fire, the rocket launches harm Israel’s sovereignty in the border region.
“We need to bring back deterrence, we need to respond to every missile,” she said. “The State of Israel cannot allow rocket fire on its territory without a response. It conveys that this type of situation is normal.”
Cohen also said Israel would have reacted much more harshly if the rockets had been fired at the center of the country.
This week’s rocket attacks ended a nearly four-month lull on the Gaza Strip border. Wednesday’s rocket fire came at the end of a tense day in Jerusalem, during which Israeli nationalists were blocked by police from marching through the Old City’s Damascus Gate, a popular meeting place for Palestinians in east Jerusalem. Hamas had threatened an attack if the march went ahead.
In recent days, violent clashes have erupted between Palestinian rioters and police on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, injuring dozens of Palestinians and several police officers.
Palestinians clash with Israeli security forces at the compound of the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem’s Old City on Friday, April 15, 2022. (AP Photo/Mahmoud Illean)
Hamas and other Gaza-based terrorist groups have repeatedly labeled the holy site’s focal point as the red line. Police action to quell unrest there over the past year was one of the triggers of an 11-day war in the Gaza Strip last May.
The Gaza Strip has been blocked by both Israel and Egypt for 15 years to contain the Hamas rulers and other groups in the enclave. Israel says the strict restrictions on goods and people are necessary because of efforts by Hamas, which vows to destroy Israel, to arm itself for massive attacks on the Jewish state.
Critics bemoan the blockade’s impact on ordinary residents of the Gaza Strip, around 50 percent of whom are unemployed, according to the Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics. The sky-high poverty rates make employment in Israel an extremely attractive option for those lucky enough to get a work permit.
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