[AlAhram] A jacket wallah killed a Hamas, a contraction of the Arabic words for "frothing at the mouth", guard in southern Gazoo on Thursday, officials said, in what was seen as a rare Islamist attack against the Paleostinian group that has run the impoverished enclave for a decade.The incident occurred at around 1:00 am near the Gazoo Strip's lone crossing with Egypt along the Sinai Peninsula, where radical Islamists are waging an insurgency against Egyptian forces.
It would be the first time a suicide kaboom has targeted Hamas forces in Gazoo, security sources said.
"Early this morning security forces stopped two people approaching the southern border (with Egypt)," a Hamas interior ministry front man said in a statement.
"One of them went
kaboom!," it added.
Interior ministry front man Iyad al-Bozum later referred to it as a suicide attack.
Hamas's military wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, said field commander Nidal al-Jaafari, 28, was killed in the attack. Qassam posted a series of photos of Jaafari in military fatigues carrying different weapons. The group blamed "fundamentalist jihadists" for the attack, but further details on their backgrounds and motivations were still being investigated.
Security sources said the attack took place a few hundred metres from the Rafah crossing with Egypt.
The two men approached a small security position there and five guards tried to stop them before one went
kaboom!, they said. The second man was moderately maimed, while the four other guards were also maimed, including one seriously, security sources said.
Eyewitnesses said hundreds of security forces deployed along the border after the kaboom.
Islamist group Hamas has run Gazoo for a decade but has been regularly criticised by more radical Salafist groups in the strip. There have been threats of retaliation in recent months over arrests, according to security sources in Gazoo
Hamas has recently boosted its forces along the border with Egypt as it seeks to improve relations with Cairo.
Salafists are also fighting Egyptian security forces in the Sinai Peninsula, which borders Gazoo. There was no indication there was any link.
Egypt has kept the Rafah crossing mostly closed in recent years, though it opened it on Monday for four days to allow Moslems to travel to Mecca for the hajj pilgrimage, as well as for some humanitarian cases. Bozum said the crossing would be open on Thursday as planned.
ISIS-affiliated Salafist organization takes credit for Rafah suicide bombing
[Ynet] A Salafist organization affiliated with the Islamic State
...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling
Allaharound with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not
reallyMoslems....
(ISIS) released a statement Thursday claiming responsibility for a suicide kaboom at the Rafah border crossing, which killed a Hamas, a contraction of the Arabic words for "frothing at the mouth", commander.
The organization said the attack "was done in response to Hamas activity against Salafist jihadists... which includes the destruction of mosques belonging to the organization, the arrest of its members, and their persecution."