Palestine Islamic Jihad (PIJ) - Rockets
PIJ's rocket arsenal amounts to around 8,000 rockets [other soruces claim more than 10,000 projectiles], and is larger than Hamas's own inventory of surface-to-surface rockets. PIJ, like Hamas, uses local manufacturing processes to develop its arsenal, and embeds the launchers in the middle of Palestinian civilian neighborhoods. Beyond this formidable arsenal, the group controls networks of weapons-production facilities and terror tunnels. Although Hamas is believed to have far more long-range rockets than PIJ, the Iranian proxy is estimated to have as many as 8,000 short-range rockets, meaning PIJ has more firepower to bring to bear than even Hamas against the nearby Gaza corridor. Since the 1980s, PIJ has trained operatives and orchestrated many terrorist attacks, including rocket attacks, suicide bombings, car bombings and shootings. PIJ attacks from 2005 through 2013 were primarily rocket attacks aimed at southern Israeli cities, but have also included attacking Israeli targets with explosive devices. PIJ claimed first ever multi-barrel launch of rockets from Gaza (October 2011). In November 2019 Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) fired more than 450 rockets into Israel from the Gaza Strip. Israelis sprinted to shelters, and the Iron Dome air-defense system shielded them from the attack. On 12 November 2019 Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) fired 190 rockets into Israel from the Gaza Strip.
December 2020-January 2021, PIJ: Soleimani personally oversaw the transfer of rockets to Gaza. In a Dec. 31, 2020, interview with Al-Mayadeen, PIJ Secretary-General Ziad al-Nakhalah said: “We have had the Kornet [missile] in our possession since 2012, as have our brothers in Hamas. In all the campaigns [against Israel] … the resistance has used them. … All the conventional weapons reached [Gaza] via al-Hajj Qassem Soleimani, Hezbollah and Syria, and the entire [resistance] axis played a part in transporting them. … There are training camps in Syria where our brothers in Hamas received special training to produce the rockets.”
Nakhalah went on to say that Soleimani had personally “supervised and directed the transfer of the missiles to Gaza [and had] traveled among several countries to persuade them [to help with this]. … He personally visited Sudan [and arrived at] a clear agreement that it [Sudan] would serve as a station for the transfer of the weapons.” Nakhalah also revealed that Soleimani had sent 10 shiploads of weapons to the Gaza Strip.
In an interview that aired on Iraq’s Al-Ahd TV on 07 May 2021, senior PIJ official Ramez al-Halabi said that the rockets used by the faction to target Tel Aviv bear the signature of Iran and Soleimani. He added that faction members were trained by the IRGC and that Iranian money was used to buy weapons for the armed factions in Gaza and Lebanon. Al-Halabi added that a portrait of Soleimani hangs in every Gaza home, and that “it is they [Iran] who support us with weapons, money, and food.”
According to an analysis published by The New York Times, 470 rockets were fired from Gaza in the first 24 hours of the conflict on 10 May 2021. PIJ claimed it launched 100 rockets against Tel Aviv, Ashdod, Beersheba, and other cities. One of those was Ashkelon, an Israeli city near Gaza on the Mediterranean Sea. PIJ claimed that it launched Badr-3 rockets at the city of approximately 140,000 people. Israel Defense Forces announced on 11 May 2021 that it had killed a senior commander in the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. Sameh Abed al-Mamluk was assassinated in an operation conducted jointly with the Shin Bet security service. Several other senior rocket officials were also killed, the IDF said.
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