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Israeli Government Could Soon Face New Iranian Terrorist Challenges
by Yaakov Lappin
Special to IPT News
April 15, 2019
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With Iran's help,
Palestinian Islamic Jihad has Gaza's largest rocket arsenal.
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In Saturday's early hours, when the attention of most Israelis was
focused on politics and elections-related matters, enormous blasts rocked a suspected Iranian
surface-to-surface missile factory on the outskirts of the town of
Masyaf, in northwest Syria. Satellite imagery showed that an entire complex
had been destroyed in the bombing.
International media reports attributed the attack to the Israel Air
Force, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, speaking a day afterwards, stated that "We are
continuing to operate on all fronts, including the northern one."
He added, "We are not prepared to allow someone to entrench
themselves in a way that endangers Israel." Netanyahu has pursued a
policy of ordering preventative military action to stop Iran's military
build-up in Syria.
The incident is a reminder that Iran and its radical terrorist axis are
continuing to try and build up their military-terrorist attack capabilities
against Israel in Syria, just as they are in other areas.
Assuming Israel was indeed behind the Masyaf attack, it likely responded
to urgent intelligence of threatening activity at the site – possibly the
conversion of rockets into precision ballistic missiles – a threat Israel has declared repeatedly that it would not tolerate.
It is also possible that Iran's Islamic Republic Guards Corps (IRGC)
tried to take advantage of the fact that Israel is in between governments,
testing Jerusalem's ability to order decisive military preventative strikes
during a sensitive political time in the country.
If this was the reasoning behind the IRGC's activities at Masyaf, its
gamble failed to pay off. The targeted facility is in an area that is
filled with multiple suspicious sites related to the Iranian and Assad
regime missile production and research and development program, according to
Israeli satellite company ISI. Previous suspicious sites, linked to
Iran's surface-to-surface missile project in Syria, have been attacked
there in recent years.
The incident is the latest reminder that the next Israeli government
will have no honeymoon period when it comes to dealing with Iran and its
proxies in the region.
Already, following the designation of the IRGC as a terrorist entity on
April 8 by the U.S., some have assessed that Iran is likely to intensify proxy attacks on Israel from Syria
and from Gaza in response.
In the Gaza Strip, Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ), the second largest
armed faction in Gaza and Iran's direct proxy, has built up an arsenal of
rockets that now surpasses that of Hamas, the largest terror faction in the
Strip.
PIJ's domestic rocket manufacturing sites in Gaza have benefited
directly from Iranian know-how and funding.
PIJ has been rebuilding its firepower since the 2014 conflict it and
Hamas fought with Israel. Today PIJ and Hamas have a combined rocket
arsenal of more than 20,000 projectiles, some of which are long-range
rockets that can fall north of Tel Aviv, as a March rocket strike on an Israeli home, injuring seven
civilians, demonstrated.
PIJ's fighting force of 10,000 armed operatives, combined with Hamas's
30,000 armed wing members, mean that Gaza has developed a terror army of
40,000 people. Together, these Iranian-funded factions threaten to
indiscriminately fire rockets at Israeli civilian neighborhoods.
Israel Defense Forces units captured two PIJ operatives who had crossed
over from Gaza on March 8, as they approached the fields of a southern
Israeli Kibbutz armed with grenades and knives.
The IDF captured the terrorists minutes before they reached the Kibbutz
Erez – an incident that underlines just how tangible the Iranian proxy
threat is from Gaza.
The fact that PIJ is now headed by a new leader, Ziad Nakhleh, who travels back and forth between Syria
and Iran, and who is extremely close to the Iranian leadership, means the
PIJ will be an ever-willing Iranian proxy, prepared to do Tehran's
terrorist bidding.
As a result, the IDF has been on high alert to such threats, including
the possibility of PIJ sniper fire from Gaza, and bombing attacks. Israeli
security sources were quoted in media reports April 1 saying that PIJ
was planning an imminent terror attack on Israel from Gaza. Citing
suspicious activity by PIJ members, the officials said the attack could
have taken the form of an anti-tank guided missile firing at Israeli
military forces; a large border IED attack, or a terror cell's intrusion
into Israel.
The warning appears to have convinced PIJ that Israeli intelligence was
on to it, and the attack did not materialize. But the reports form one more
illustration of how Iranian-backed terror forces can destabilize the region
with ease.
Ultimately, Iran wishes to keep Israel busy around its borders with
proxy threats, on the defensive, and deterred. Israel's defense
establishment appears to have proven in recent days no matter what the
political situation in Israel, it stands alert and ready to act against developing
Iranian-backed terror threats.
Nevertheless, the Syrian and Gazan arenas will be worth watching in the
coming weeks as potential Iranian attack fronts, for Tehran has shown no
intention of backing away from its commitment to build up and activate bases
of attack against Israel.
Iran's activities are not, unfortunately, limited to these areas, as a
recent warning by Israel's Counter-Terrorism Bureau noted. According to the
advisory, Europe also faces a threat. The advisory in effect for April and
May stated "Iran and front members on its behalf are continuing to act
to build terrorist infrastructure – mainly against 'regime opponents' in
Europe – [yet] in line with an Iranian decision, this infrastructure could
also be used for terrorist attacks against Israeli targets."
Yaakov Lappin is a military and strategic affairs correspondent. He
also conducts research and analysis for defense think tanks, and is the
Israel correspondent for IHS Jane's Defense Weekly. His book, The
Virtual Caliphate, explores the online jihadist presence.
Related Topics: Yaakov
Lappin, Iran
proxies, Gaza
terrorism, rockets,
Palestinian
Islamic Jihad, Ziad
Nakhleh, Hamas,
Benjamin
Netanyahu, Israeli
elections, Islamic
Republic Guard Corps, pre-emptive
strikes
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