YAAKOV KATZ -IDF preparing for major Gaza action within months
Dr. Aaron Lerner - IMRA:
"The IDF, officers stressed, has not received orders from the government to
launch an operation and the preparations are being done so that it will be
prepared at a moment’s notice and if needed." = The IDF will not take the
blame for a decision by the ruling government not to act in Gaza. The IDF
apparently intends to have everything in place - both in terms of equipment
and personnel as well as planning.
The possible downside: this strips the prime minister of face saving while
he stalls for time in the hopes that diplomacy rather than military action
can resolve the challenge.
The possible gain: the more prepared the plans are the greater the chances,
hopefully, that they will be reviewed and refined so that they are
successful if and when they are implemented. Also the more prepared the
plans, hopefully the more realistic the projections of the possible outcomes
of their implementation as have more time to think them through.]
IDF preparing for major Gaza action within months
By YAAKOV KATZ The Jerusalem Post 01/16/2012 23:54
Concern growing over anti-tank missile smuggling into Strip; senior officer
says Hamas, Islamic Jihad have increased weaponry.
The IDF General Staff has ordered the Southern Command to prepare for a
possible large Gaza operation that could occur within the next few months,
The Jerusalem Post has learned.
Preparations include finalizing operational plans and distributing them
between the various units that would be deployed inside Gaza.
During Operation Cast Lead, Israel’s anti-Hamas ground incursion launched in
late 2008, the IDF established brigade-level units that combined armor,
infantry and combat engineer forces.
A similar model would likely be applied in a future operation in Gaza as
well.
The Gaza Division, under the command of Brig.-Gen. Yossi Bachar, is
spearheading the preparations for such an operation, which senior officers
said could be significantly larger than Cast Lead.
“Every officer will need to know where he needs to be with his troops and
what his mission will be,” a senior officer explained. “Gaza has changed and
the weaponry in Hamas’s and Islamic Jihad’s hands has significantly grown in
quantity and quality.”
Hamas is believed to have a fighting force number over 20,000 armed men who
are split into five brigades corresponding with different sections of the
Gaza Strip. Each brigade is then split into a number of battalions. In
addition, Hamas also has special teams for surveillance, anti-tank missiles,
mortar and rocket fire and anti-aircraft shoulder-to-air missiles.
The IDF, officers stressed, has not received orders from the government to
launch an operation and the preparations are being done so that it will be
prepared at a moment’s notice and if needed.
“Gaza is possibly Israel’s most volatile front today,” a member of the
General Staff said this week. “It is a front that can explode at any given
moment.”
While the situation along the Gaza border is currently relatively quiet, a
single attack by Hamas or another Palestinian terrorist group – by a
Katyusha rocket or an anti-tank missile – could force Israel to retaliate in
a way that would lead to a broader escalation.
In April, for example, Hamas fired an anti-tank missile at a school bus,
killing 16-year-old Daniel Viflic and just moments after it dropped off a
group of schoolchildren.
In 2011, 680 rockets and mortar shells were fired into Israel, including 80
longrange Grad-model Katyusha rockets in comparison to just 2 Grads in 2010.
Currently, the IDF believes Hamas’s interest is to retain quiet in Gaza as
it works to stabilize its control over the territory.
At the same time though, the IDF is extremely concerned with the smuggling
of sophisticated weaponry into Gaza – such as the Russian-made Kornet
anti-tank missile and shoulder-to-air missiles that were stolen from Libyan
military storehouses.
The IDF believes Hamas and Islamic Jihad currently have just a few hundred
advanced anti-tank missiles in Gaza but that the number will continue to
increase reaching close to 4,000 by 2017.
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IMRA - Independent Media Review and Analysis
Website: www.imra.org.il
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