By Stan Goodenough
Jan 15, 2006
In the four months since Israel abandoned the Gaza Strip, uprooting its Jewish residents and pulling out its forces, the freed-up Palestinian Arabs have succeeded in dramatically increasing the range of the rockets they are firing at Israelis on an almost daily basis.
According to reports last week, the ?Palestinians? have now acquired the technology to extend the reach of their Kassams from 14 km to 40 km, substantially increasing the number of Israeli targets they can reach.
Fatah, Hamas and the Palestine Islamic Jihad are all working to acquire missiles that can draw Jewish blood in the run-up to the Palestinian Authority elections later this month.
A successful strike that leaves Jews dead and maimed will boost support for the responsible terror group when the ?Palestinians? go to the polls on January 25.
The World Tribune Thursday quoted Israeli officials as saying that ?there has been a significant leap in Palestinian rocket development? since August. While the full results of their progress were not yet visible, it was ?safe to say that they have achieved a breakthrough.?
This follows events out of Lebanon where members of a successfully recruited Al-Qaeda group that is believed to have fired Katyusha rockets at northern Israel last month were arrested January 7 trying to smuggle long-range rockets to the Gaza Strip.
On January 10 the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee heard that weapons smuggling into Gaza has increased 10-fold since Israel?s departure.
Neither the Palestinian Authority nor Egypt have made an effort to halt the flow of munitions and weapons-advisors into the Strip.