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Israel-Palestine-Jordan
Israeli Strike Kills 5 Militants in Gaza
2007-12-02
GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip (AP) - Gaza militants threatened Saturday to fire longer-range rockets and target larger Israeli communities, after five Hamas members are killed in an Israeli airstrike. Early Saturday, an Israeli airstrike killed five Hamas militants near the southern town of Khan Younis. Eight others were wounded, one critically, medical officials said. Hamas said the men were on a night patrol east of Khan Younis. The army said it carried out the strike after identifying armed men near its border with Gaza.

A spokesman for the Islamic Jihad group said its engineers are trying to produce local copies of Russian-made 122mm Katyusha rockets, which have a reach of up to 19 miles, or halfway from Gaza to Tel Aviv. A senior Hamas official said his group was developing a more lethal type of warhead for the rockets it regularly lobs into Israel, and Abu Mujahed, a spokesman for the Popular Resistance Committees, a group allied with Hamas, said his organization had plans to fire longer-range rockets. ``The real barrage of rockets has not yet begun,'' said Abu Mujahed, whose brother was killed in Saturday's airstrike, adding that ``22 kilometers is not the ceiling.''
His brother's ceiling now is about two meters.
It was an apparent reference to 122mm Katyusha rockets that can hit targets 12 to 19 miles away, about twice the range of the thousands of homemade Qassam projectiles that Gaza militants have fired at Israel communities in recent years. Katyushas are deadlier than the homemade rockets and put larger Israeli communities near Gaza into rocket range. Netivot, a town of 25,000, is 10 miles northeast of Gaza, and Ashkelon, a port city where 115,000 Israelis live, is about 8 miles away.

Katyusha fire from Gaza has been rare. The Islamic Jihad militant group claims to have fired three Russian-made rockets at Israel since March 2006, and to have ``many'' in their possession. Israel estimates that a dozen Katyushas were smuggled into Gaza since it left the strip in September 2005.
Posted by:Steve White

#11  One of these days, Old Patriot, you're going to get that ARCLIGHT strike you've been craving for so long. It seems the kind of thing President Guiliani or President Thompson might enjoy -- truly effective communication. ;-)
Posted by: trailing wife   2007-12-02 21:22  

#10  Almost makes me wonder why Israel doen't just go ahead and do whatever it that the UNSC is preventing them from doing. Surely our strategist must know that the UN has no teeth.
Posted by: Mike N.   2007-12-02 21:09  

#9  If Bush really wants "peace" in the muddled east

All he has to do is to convince Israeli leadership that any anti-Israeli motion coming to UNSC will be vetoed by USA.
I see, at least, two impossibilities here.
Posted by: g(r)omgoru   2007-12-02 20:35  

#8  If Bush really wants "peace" in the muddled east, all he has to do is run a single ARCLIGHT strile in trail formation, loaded to the gills with plain old 500lb iron bombs, on a bombing run down through the center of Gaza. There won't be enough survivors to to form a bridge table. Then Israel can claim the land that belongs to them anyway, and the US will take the censure. The rest of the ay-rabs will then understand that we're tired of the SOS (same old sh$$), and will do what it takes to stop the constant bloodshed. Anyone that doesn't learn will die.
Posted by: Old Patriot   2007-12-02 17:47  

#7  While it appears that Hamas doesn't understand cause and effect, it may just be that they're suicidal and homicidal. Suicidal because they're willing to risk their lives to fire their pop guns across the wall. Homicidal because they're looking to trade in their pop guns for heavy artillery. Either way, these bad little boys need to be grounded for awhile and cutting off fuel, electricity, and water seems entirely appropriate. I'd suggest Israel just give 24 hours notice and then permanently reduce each by 5% every time a rocket comes over the wall. Maybe once supply goes down permanently there will be some significant internal dissent.

World opinion be damned. Name one other country in the world that tolerates a steady stream of rocket hits from its next door neighbor. Israel has already shown entirely too much restraint. It is ludicrous that Israel supplies Gaza with anything.
Posted by: Darrell   2007-12-02 15:32  

#6  "the Paleos will turn the water issue around and use it as a propaganda tool of war against Israel"

Hell, AP, the paleoswineians use the sun rising in the East as a propaganda tool of war against Israel. I say the Israelis should go for it. :-D
Posted by: Barbara Skolaut   2007-12-02 15:20  

#5  I didn't say it would be different than now, just more vocal. This is an example of my Hoola-Hoop principle.
Posted by: Deacon Blues   2007-12-02 15:19  

#4  Ima just sayin' that the terrorists would have to start dealing with water issues, which, uh, consumes a lot of your waking time when you are desperately short.

I will agree with you, Deacon, that the Paleos will turn the water issue around and use it as a propaganda tool of war against Israel.
Posted by: Alaska Paul   2007-12-02 14:38  

#3  Israel would be subject to extreme world-wide criticism

and that would be different, how? The "outrage list" appears that it begins with the Jooos not dying fast enough and continues from there. Israel should say: "nobody is required to subsidize their own death, and we sure the f*ck won't either", then do it
Posted by: Frank G   2007-12-02 12:50  

#2  No it won't AP. The Palestinians lack the mechanism for identifying cause and effect. The world will blame the vicious Jews for the hardsuip of the women and children. Israel would be subject to extreme world-wide critisism.
Posted by: Deacon Blues   2007-12-02 12:28  

#1  Turn off the power and water to Gaza and this Katusha sh*t will stop in a New York Minute.
Posted by: Alaska Paul   2007-12-02 01:42  

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