Hamas Withdraws 'Anti-Missile' Force from Israel Border
إقرأ هذا الخبر بالعربية
The Hamas rulers of Gaza have withdrawn a special security force tasked with preventing rocket launches at Israel from their position near the border, a security source said on Sunday.
"The field forces that are posted near the border with Israel were withdrawn yesterday evening to protest the latest escalation and Israeli attacks against Gaza," a security source told Agence France Presse.
Speaking on condition of anonymity, the source told AFP that while the 600-strong rocket-prevention force was removed, regular security forces remained in place.
The move comes a day after Israeli fighter jets attacked Hamas military positions in the Palestinian enclave in response to a rocket attack at a southern Israeli town.
Tensions have risen in and around Gaza after a year of relative calm, with six Palestinians and an Israeli killed since December 20 and militant rocket fire sparking retaliatory air strikes.
On January 21, Hamas said it had deployed forces in Gaza to "preserve the truce" with Israel that ended the last major confrontation in November 2012.
While Hamas does not routinely launch projectiles at the Jewish state, Israel says it holds the Islamist group that seized power in Gaza in 2007 responsible for any such attacks.
02 February 2014, 22:31
22
The irony is that when hamas was not in power they used to brag how they are still are fighting Israel and Fate7 is not. Now they are in power they know that the safety of the people of is their responsibitlity and therefore stupid rocket attacks like this are useless and shouldn't be carried out....resistance is synonymous to hypocrisy unfortunately
03 February 2014, 05:10
01
It is not the safety of their own people that concerns them, it is more their own safety and their ability to hold on to power. Too much death and misery will turn the population against them, so they play the game of survival. They just needd to appear like they are more determined than PLO, nothing else. Just like the two guys running away from a bear, Hamas is the guy that know he does not have to out-run the bear, only the other man.
