Thursday, January 1, 2009

Hamas launching rockets manufactured in China

Latest rockets manufactured in China

Yaakov Katz , THE JERUSALEM POST Jan. 1, 2009

www.jpost.com

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The Grad-model Katyusha rockets that were fired into Beersheba on Wednesday were manufactured in China and smuggled into Gaza after the Sinai border wall was blown up by Hamas in January, defense officials said.

The Chinese rockets have a range of 40 kilometers. They are very similar to the 122 mm Soviet-made Katyusha that was used extensively by Hizbullah during the Second Lebanon War and are slightly more sophisticated than an Iranian-made Grad-model Katyusha that is also in Hamas's arsenal.

The four rockets that hit Beersheba this week were filled with metal balls that can scatter up to 100 meters from the impact site, officials said. These rockets have also been fired into Ashkelon and Ashdod.

The three countries that manufacture Grad-model Katyushas are China, Russia and Bulgaria.

Defense officials told The Jerusalem Post the rockets were smuggled into Gaza in the 12 days after Hamas blew a hole in the border wall between Gaza and Egypt on January 23.

"Huge quantities of weaponry were smuggled into Gaza then from above ground, including the Grad rockets," an official said, adding that even after the border wall was sealed, Hamas continued to smuggle the long-range rockets into Gaza via tunnels under the Philadelphi Corridor.

From China, the rockets make several stops before reaching Gaza. In many cases, officials said, they are bought by Iran or Hizbullah and then transferred to Sinai.

In some instances, the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) has learned of weapons that came from Yemen and Eritrea, were moved to Sudan, then north to Egypt, and finally smuggled into Gaza.

"This is a complicated smuggling system that involves many different people around the world," one official said.

The Grad-model Katyushas, officials said, were packed with large quantities of ammonia and less-than-maximum explosives to increase their durability and lethality.

Last Thursday, Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Aboul Gheit told Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni that Cairo was not responsible for Hamas's military buildup and that the long-range rockets in the group's arsenal were not smuggled through the tunnels from Sinai.

Defense officials said Wednesday that Aboul Gheit was partially correct, in that some of the rockets did not come into Gaza through tunnels, but that they did enter the Strip from Sinai.

• The NY Times confirms the quality of Israeli intelligence:

Muhammad al-Zarb said that the Israelis somehow seemed to know which tunnels were commercial and which were run by Hamas, and that they seemed to be selective in their bombing. “If someone has a tunnel for Chipsy, it seems O.K.,” he said. “When a Hamas guy has a tunnel for weapons, they bomb it.”

• Jeffrey Goldberg on Fatah:

I've been talking to friends of mine, former Palestinian Authority intelligence officials (ejected from power by the Hamas coup), and they tell me that not only are they rooting for the Israelis to decimate Hamas, but that Fatah has actually been assisting the Israelis with targeting information.

• AP after an Israeli air strike destroyed a mosque:

"The strike set off numerous secondary explosions, caused by the munitions stockpiled in the mosque," the spokesman said. Israel would continue to attack militant targets, "even if they (Hamas) cynically choose to operate from locations of religious or cultural significance."

• An ominous Wall St. Journal foreshadow of what's in store for IDF ground forces:

"We don't wear our uniforms, and we carry smaller guns so the Israelis can't identify us," said a 32-year-old police lieutenant, who said his first name was Muhammad but refused to give his last name.

• Robert Lieber on Arabs leaving Hamas hanging:

. . . any realistic hope of progress toward a peaceful resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and a successful two-state solution requires that Hamas suffer a severe setback in the present fighting in ways that seriously damage its capabilities and weaken its political credibility among Palestinians. Leading officials of Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the Palestinian Authority know this and, notwithstanding their formulaic criticisms of Israel, have explicitly blamed Hamas for the current violence.

I don't make the rules I just follow them.

and their war against carbon based life forms. allahu brokeback.

When bloggers push away from the MacBook and repeat aloud what they just spent all day hammering.

While entertaining to his 9 friends, it's not quality stuff.

You need a criminal conviction. Burris will get the job and the Senate will seat him and you morons will look like you usually do.

http://aid2gaza.blogspot.com/

http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5gzTzyMkBVuWOrOkjlgTIze3Qn8tA

The kind of open dialog Glenn Greenwald could be proud of.

http://blog.z-word.com/2008/12/gaza-and-the-labor-unions/

Hmmm....a strange posture for socialist heroes.