IOA to rally international support for major operation against Gaza

The Israeli occupation authority has decided to embark on a world-wide media campaign to rally international support for an expected military operation against the Gaza Strip.

Hebrew daily Yediot Ahronot said that Tel Aviv was planning a wave of diplomatic campaigns to recruit an “international umbrella” that would support it in the event a large-scale military operation against Gaza was launched.

The campaign apparently kicked off when Yuval Diskin, the head of the Israeli general security apparatus the Shabak, claimed that Hamas Movement in Gaza obtained new missiles capable of reaching Ashdod and the outskirts of Beer Sheba.

Diskin told the Israeli weekly cabinet meeting on Sunday that Hamas was not willing to use those new missiles unless it was hardly hit by the Israeli army.

He argued that Hamas was interested in having calm in the Strip but wanted to improve its conditions.

Meanwhile, Abu Ataya, the spokesman of the Nasser Salahuddin Brigades, the armed wing of the Popular Resistance Committees, said in a statement on Monday that grave consequences would befall the “Zionist entity” if it ventured into the Gaza Strip.

He said that the IOF could determine the start of any such invasion but would never be able to determine its end, warning that the confrontation would not be limited to the Strip.