Observers fear that escalating Palestinian rocket fire will trigger deterioration along Israel’s border with the Gaza Strip, months after assessments began to harden that the Palestinian Hamas faction was seeking to escalate violence in order to boost its precipitously deteriorating regional and domestic positions. On Monday rocket fire forced school closures in the Israeli city of Ashdod and on Tuesday a rocket slammed into an area outside of the Israeli resort city of Eilat. Monday also saw Palestinian fighters detonate an explosive near the Israel-Gaza border, along a road patrolled by the Israeli military. The Israelis have linked cells from the Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) and Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) to the barrages, and have held Hamas responsible for permitting fire out of the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip. Thus far Israel’s efforts at disrupting the attacks have largely involved actions aimed at the two former groups, and the Israeli Air Force struck PIJ and PFLP targets on Sunday and Tuesday respectively. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu indicated yesterday, however, that Israel’s efforts will expand to include Hamas if rocket and missile fire directed at Israeli communities continues.

“We foil terrorist attacks when we identify that they are in the making, and we respond against those who attack us,” Netanyahu’s spokesperson, Ofir Gendelman, quoted him as saying. “If Hamas and the other terror organizations have forgotten this lesson, they will learn it again the hard way – and very soon,” the prime minister said.

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