By Xinhua
Gaza : An aide to deposed Hamas Prime Minister Ismail Haneya on Thursday said Iranian-made Grad rockets are smuggled into Gaza across the Mediterranean Sea, not through underground tunnels with Egypt.
“Grad rockets are long and sensitive and the Egyptian statements that these rockets don’t enter through its territories are true,” Ahmed Yousef, Haneya’s political advisor, told reporters in Gaza.
Though Israel controls the sea, Palestinian armed groups “were able to bring that kind of rockets” into Gaza, Yousef said, noting that “the Palestinian resistance knows how to get the Grad rockets.”
Other rockets which Palestinian militants often launch into Israel are manufactured locally, according to Yousef, who clarified he was not “a rocket expert.”
Yousef also ruled out the reinforcement of calmness following the death of four Palestinian militants in West Bank town of Bethlehem killed by Israeli undercover forces.
“This barbaric act proves that Israel is not interested in peace and doesn’t want calmness with the Palestinians,” he said.
Asked if Hamas will resume rocket attacks on Israel, Yousef said the assassination of the four Palestinian militants “requires responses from all sides.”
On Thursday, Islamic Jihad (Holy War) movement fired two dozens of shells into Israeli communities near Gaza, breaking a few days of lull in fighting between Israel and Palestinian militants.
The movement said the resumption of rocket attacks was in retaliation for the killing of the four militants in the West Bankon Wednesday.