Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has warned against a reported Israeli plan to launch a second military offensive against Palestinians in Gaza.
Israeli deputy prime minister Silvan Shalom said Friday that a military operation will soon be launched in response to rocket attacks from Gaza, which involve home-made rockets that usually carry little or no explosive warhead.
On Thursday, a single Qassam rocket landed near the Israeli town of Ashkelon on Thursday and caused some minor damages but no casualties.
Although the Palestinian Resistance movement of Hamas did not claim responsibility for the attack, Israel nevertheless responded to the incident by carrying out six waves of air raids overnight.
“If this rocket fire against Israel does not stop … it will force us to launch another military operation,” Shalom told public radio.
Hamas has emphasized that it is looking to calm the situation. In an April 1 phone conversation with the Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, the Chairman of Hamas Political Bureau Khaled Mashaal said: “Hamas is not interested in the escalation of tensions and is taking corresponding measures to prevent missile strikes from the Gaza,” reported ITAR-Tass News Agency.
President Ahmadinejad, in a formal speech at the inauguration of the Middle East’s biggest iron ore pellet factory in the southern city of Sirjan, warned Israel against making plans for a new offensive against Gazans, who are still reeling from the devastating attack by Tel Aviv two years ago.
They are looking for an excuse to attack Gaza. What I want to say to Zionists and their supporters is ‘enough with the crimes. Do not make your load [of sin] even heavier than it is’.
The president said “the myth of an undefeatable Israel was over,” adding that Tel Aviv was only trying to maintain its image of a dreaded power to sustain its existence.
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