Hamas spokesman Sami Abu Zuhri has said that the elusive head of the
terror group's "military wing", Mohammed Deif, is still "alive and well"
despite an IDF assassination attempt which killed his wife and son.
"The occupation will pay for its crimes against the Palestinian
people," declared Abu-Zuhri, who added a chilling warning to the people
of southern Israel.
"The residents of the Gaza periphery will return to their homes only
by the decision of the commander Mohammed Deif and one Israeli
commitment to stop the aggression and lift the siege," he threatened.
Adding to the threats, Hamas spokesperson Fawzi Barhoum said
Wednesday that "difficult days" are coming for both Israel and Gaza, as
an escalation in the violence is expected.
"(Prime Minister Binyamin) Netanyahu and (Foreign Minister Avigdor)
Liberman must prepare themselves for difficult days. They have never
seen such (difficult days) in this war or its predecessors," said
Barhoum.
Foreign reports indicate that the IDF took a shot at Hamas' Izz-a-Din-al-Qassam commander Mohammed Deif on Tuesday night. It was not the first time. Deif is apparently in hiding with the Hamas leadership, but two people in his house were killed and the house was likely destroyed.
This is from the first link.
Deif is considered the official who determines the agenda of the Izz
ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades and is regarded as the “brain” behind Hamas.
He is likely hiding underground somewhere inside Gaza, fearing the IDF will try to eliminate him.
Deif started out as a student of Yahya Ayyash, who was nicknamed “the
Engineer” and who was the chief bombmaker of Hamas in the late 1990s,
when the organization started carrying out suicide bombing attacks
within Israel. Ayyash was eliminated by Israel in 1996.
Following Ayyash’s elimination, Deif carried out numerous murderous
terror attacks in Israel, including two suicide bombing attacks on buses
in Jerusalem and kidnapping attempts within Israel.
Israel tried to kill Mohammed Deif several times, without success.
One time, he lost an eye and likely his hand as well. In another attempt
he was seriously wounded, his hands and legs were amputated and he has
been confined to a wheelchair ever since.
Ayyash is the guy who answered his cell phone and had it blow his head off :-)
You can bet that when we get Deif, we will get the same reactions we got when the IDF eliminated Sheikh Ahmad Yassin: That we're going after poor old men in wheelchairs. Right....
We now know why the Mossad had Dirar Abu Sesi arrested in the Ukraine and hustled back to Israel. No, it wasn't because of things he knew about Gilad Shalit, although that may also be true. Dirar Abu Sesi is the Godfather of Hamas' rocket industry.
According to the indictment, Abu Sisi received his doctorate at the Kharkov Military Engineering Academy and studied under Prof. Konstantin Petrovich, an expert in Scud missile control systems.
During his studies, Abu Sisi acquired extensive knowledge in missile development, control systems, propulsion and rocket stabilization.
After returning to the Gaza Strip and parallel to his work as an engineer for the Gaza electric company, Abu Sisi was secretly recruited into Hamas by the military commander of the terrorist organization at the time, Salah Shehadeh, and began working as one of their leading engineers for short- and long-range missiles.
Abu Sisi not only developed missiles in Gaza but was also, according to the charge sheet, responsible for upgrading thousands of older rockets and increasing their range and penetration capabilities.
According to the indictment, which was filed on Monday in the Beersheba District Court, Abu Sisi was charged with membership in a terrorist organization, conspiracy to commit a crime, the production of illegal weaponry, assistance to an illegal organization, and a variety of other crimes.
During his interrogation, officials said, Abu Sisi provided valuable intelligence information on Hamas’s military wing, its different branches and the decision-making process within the terror group.
Abu Sesi was a key cog in turning Hamas from a terrorist organization into a military force.
Monday’s indictment against Abu Sisi is also unique. First, it is longer than most indictments filed in Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency) investigations and goes into extreme detail – such as the exact number of centimeters of armor the anti-tank missiles he developed can penetrate – as if the prosecution or the Shin Bet felt like it needed to justify the saga behind his arrest.
Second, it provides unprecedented insight into the Hamas military wing and how it has turned into a military one would expect to see in a country – not just with brigades, battalions and special forces, but also with an in-house defense industry.
Hamas’s interest in establishing a Gaza-based weapons production capability is likely a sign of the organization’s ultimate desire to become independent one day of its patrons in Tehran and Damascus. It could also be a sign of Hamas concern that one day Israel, Egypt and the rest of the world will begin to take more effective steps to prevent arms smuggling to Gaza, meaning that its supply from Iran will slow down.
It is unclear what effect the removal of Abu Sisi from Gaza will have on Hamas and its military capabilities. Was he working on developing a new weapon for Hamas? Has he already trained replacements and successors? In addition, was this history of his – as revealed in the indictment – enough to justify an operation to capture Abu Sisi in Ukraine, as foreign reports suggest Israel did? This might have been the case. Many of the details surrounding him and his arrest are still banned for publication.
What I am wondering is why we didn't just treat him like Hamas' previous engineer, Yihye Ayash.
Let's go to the videotape.
Maybe Abu Sesi has some valuable intelligence information after all. By the way, Hamas wasn't the only one who mourned Ayash's death. So did Yasser Arafat.
Most of you probably don't recognize the picture at the top of this post. Many of you may not even recognize his name. The 'Engineer' - Yihye Ayyash - was one of the 'pioneers' of suicide bombing. His life was terminated 15 years ago this past week, when a cellular phone on which he was speaking blew his head off. This article has some details of the hit that I had never heard before.
On the morning of January 5, 1996, the Palestinian sitting atop of Israel’s most-wanted list answered a mobile phone call from his father in the northern Gaza Strip town of Beit Lahiya. A few seconds into the conversation, after a surveillance plane overhead apparently verified that it was indeed Yehiyeh Ayash speaking on the phone, a radio signal was sent from the plane and the cellular phone exploded, killing the Hamas terrorist bomb-builder responsible for dozens of Israeli deaths.
...
The assassination was a huge accomplishment for the security services. “The Engineer” had managed to evade capture and assassination by Israel multiple times over three years by using master disguises, secret hideouts and trusting only a small circle of family and friends. It would ultimately be that close circle that betrayed the top terrorist.
Believing that Ayash was in the Gaza Strip for several months, the security services began searching for a way to get the Hamas terrorist. According to numerous reports, it was the uncle of his close friend whom he was living with, a man who had previously worked with the security services, who managed to locate and pass him the booby-trapped cellular phone that decapitated him. By the time Ayash received the phone call that ended his life, the uncle, Kamal Hamad, had disappeared from the region, and was reported to have been given passage to the United States.
I wonder how many other 'Palestinians' are now living abroad courtesy of Israel.
I am an Orthodox Jew - some would even call me 'ultra-Orthodox.' Born in Boston, I was a corporate and securities attorney in New York City for seven years before making aliya to Israel in 1991 (I don't look it but I really am that old :-). I have been happily married to the same woman for thirty-five years, and we have eight children (bli ayin hara) ranging in age from 13 to 33 years and nine grandchildren. Four of our children are married! Before I started blogging I was a heavy contributor on a number of email lists and ran an email list called the Matzav from 2000-2004. You can contact me at: IsraelMatzav at gmail dot com
