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Israel counter-missile plan: Assassinate, don't invade

SPECIAL TO WORLD TRIBUNE.COM
Monday, June 12, 2006

TEL AVIV — Israel is reviewing a plan to assassinate Hamas leaders due to the failure of other measures to stop an escalation in Palestinian missile strikes.

Under the recommendation, the military would first concentrate on destroying Kassam missile facilities and personnel. In the second stage, the targets would include Hamas political leaders.

The plan does not include a ground invasion of the Gaza Strip, a key recommendation of the military's Southern Command, Middle East Newsline reported.

"We are preparing for all plans," Defense Minister Amir Peretz said. "We have many possibilities. We have enough means and we will use them against any source. No position will serve as a shield for somebody whom we have determined was involved in the planning and launch of fire."

Officials said the plan marked a series of options ordered by Peretz as Palestinian missile attacks from the Gaza Strip continued to increase. They said Peretz and Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz have concluded that Hamas, directed by the leadership in Damascus, has been responsible for the launch of scores of Kassam-class, short-range missiles toward Israel over the last five days.

"There is tremendous frustration in the military," an official said. "Everything that has been approved has not worked."

Officials said Peretz, who rejected a military plan to invade the Gaza Strip, has told military commanders that he would approve additional measures. But Peretz, who has suspended artillery fire against Kassam missile squads, was said to have delayed any operation against Hamas leaders for at least two days.

On Monday, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert began a four-day European tour that included meetings with British and French leaders. Olmert said he would brief European leaders on his plan for a unilateral withdrawal from more than 90 percent of the West Bank.

On June 8, Israel assassinated Interior Ministry director-general Jamal Abu Samhadana, the architect of most of the missile strikes against Israel over the last year. Under the military plan, Palestinian missile squads, their operators and financiers would be targeted.

On Monday, Tsahi Hanegbi, the chairman of the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, said the new military policy could target PA Prime Minister Ismail Haniya. Hanegbi said Haniya could join late Hamas leaders Ahmed Yassin and Abdul Aziz Rentisi, killed in Israeli air strikes in 2003.

"Yassin and Rentisi are waiting for Haniya if you maintain this disgusting policy of indiscriminate fire and suicide bombings," Hanegbi said in an interview with Israel Army radio.

On Sunday, the Israel Air Force killed two senior Hamas operatives in northern Gaza suspected of firing missiles toward the Israeli city of Sderot, where Peretz lives. An Israeli was seriously injured.

"We will continue to pursue the Kassam squads and the Kassam manufacturers and those who dispatch them because we feel that we cannot simply hold our position while all the citizens of Israel are under threat, cannot simply sit on the side and watch, because that is not our job," Halutz said. "Our job is to continue to deal with the Kassam rockets, their launchers and manufacturers."

Overnight Monday, Palestinian gunners fired another 14 Kassams toward Israel. Most of the missiles fell around Sderot.

"We have decided to turn Sderot into a ghost town," Hamas said in a statement.


Copyright © 2006 East West Services, Inc.

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