Officials said the Palestinian strikes reflected enhanced missile and
rocket capability by the Hamas regime, Middle East Newsline reported. They said the regime has received
scores of Grad rockets and components in January 2008 in wake of the Hamas
bombing of the 12-kilometer Gaza-Sinai border wall.
Hamas has been expanding the range of its indigenous missiles and
rockets to that of the BM-21. Officials said that by the end of 2008, Hamas
would be able to produce weapons with a range of 20 kilometers. Ashkelon is
located nine kilometers from the northern edge of the Gaza Strip.
"Hamas is a strategic threat when it gets rockets as a gift from the
Iranians," Amos Gilead, the head of the Defense Ministry's
political-military division, said.
The Grad 122 mm rockets were said to have been a variant of an Iranian
weapon deployed by Hizbullah in the 2006 war against Israel. Officials said
the rockets enabled Hamas to target everything from homes to strategic
facilities in Ashkelon.
Hamas, which receives at least $10 million a year from Iran, has
overcome technical obstacles that enables the regime to increase production
and store missiles for months at a time. Hamas was said to be capable of
producing up to 100 Kassams per day and has an inventory of nearly 1,000
rockets and missiles.
"We are doing our best to upgrade our capabilities," Hamas spokesman Abu
Obeida said. "We will never have equipment comparable to our enemy, but we
are working all the time to have enough to make any aggression a regrettable
adventure for the enemy."
On Thursday, Barak ordered the activation of the missile alert system in
Ashkelon. Officials said the decision reflected a government assessment that
Hamas would focus its strikes on Ashkelon rather than limiting attacks to
Sderot, located about three kilometers from the Gaza Strip.
"Israel has to make a strategic decision," Tsahi Hanegbi, chairman of
the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee, said.
