Defiant Hamas and Islamic Jihad officials said on Sunday that they don\u2019t rule out the possibility that the current round of fighting in the Gaza Strip could lead to an all-out war with Israel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The warning came as leaders of the two Palestinian groups continued their discussions in Cairo with senior Egyptian intelligence officials on ways of ending the current round of fighting with the Jewish state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Unconfirmed reports on Sunday evening claimed that Hamas has indicated its readiness for a ceasefire with Israel. Hamas officials in the Gaza Strip did not comment on the reports.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Islamic Jihad spokesman Musab al-Braim said that the \u201cresistance was on the threshold of a new phase in repelling the [Israeli] aggression that could lead to an open war.\u201d He said that in light of the continued \u201caggression on our people and the targeting of children, houses and the implementation of the policy of assassinations, we are on the threshold of this phase, and we will not have mercy on this enemy.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ahmed al-Mudalal, a senior Islamic Jihad official, said that the \u201ccurrent Zionist escalation on the Gaza Strip is a serious attempt to break the will of the Palestinian people and divert attention from the March of Return [weekly protests near the border with Israel].\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Mudalal warned that the Palestinian terror groups will not stand idly by toward the \u201cZionist aggression against the Palestinian people, and have the full right to respond to these attacks.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In a statement issued on Sunday evening, Islamic Jihad said that it was ready to wage an \u201copen confrontation\u201d with Israel. It said that the continuation of Israeli military strikes \u201cwill be met with a similar and large-scale response\u201d targeting all Israel.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In a separate statement, Islamic Jihad announced that six of its men were killed in Israeli military strikes in the past few hours. It identified the men as Mahmoud Subhi Issa, 26; Fawzi Abdel Halim Bawadi, 24; Bilal Mohammed al-Banna, 28; Abdullah Nofal Abu al-Ata, 21; Mohammed Abdel al-Nabi Abu Armaneh, 32; and Mahmoud Samir Abu Armaneh, 27.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Israel\u2019s threats against the Palestinian \u201cresistance don\u2019t scare us,\u201d said Mushir al-Masri, a senior Hamas official. \u201cWe are confident that the resistance is capable of teaching the enemy harsh and painful lessons.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Israel, he added, will not \u201csee security as long as the blockade, sanctions and aggression continue.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Hamas official called on the Palestinian Authority to lift the sanctions it imposed on the Gaza Strip about two years ago.
Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum held Israel fully responsible for the \u201cconsequences of its crimes and violations against the Palestinians and failure to implement the recent Egyptian-sponsored ceasefire understandings. \u201cThe resistance won\u2019t allow Israel to repeat its crimes and will continue to defend the Palestinian people,\u201d Barhoum said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Another Hamas official, Fathi Kar\u2019awi, condemned the \u201ccowardly\u201d Israeli military strikes against the Gaza Strip and called on the international community to hold Israel to account for its \u201ccrimes against the people of the Gaza Strip.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Meanwhile, Palestinian political analyst Hassan Lafi told the Islamic Jihad-affiliated Palestine Today news site that by resorting to targeted assassinations in the Gaza Strip, Israel could pave the way for a new stage that may lead to an open war. Israel, he said, has \u201cchanged the rules of engagement that followed the 2014 war\u201d \u2013 a reference to Operation Protective Edge. Lafi, however, said he believes that Israel\u2019s decision to resume targeted assassinations \u201cproves that it wants to end this round of escalation quickly.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The warning came as leaders of the two Palestinian groups continued their discussions in Cairo with senior Egyptian intelligence officials on ways of ending the current round of fighting with Israel. Defiant Hamas and Islamic Jihad officials said on Sunday that they don\u2019t rule out the possibility that the current round of fighting in the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":65,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[23,24,22],"class_list":["post-64","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pete-santilli-post","tag-gaza","tag-hamas","tag-israel"],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/petersantilli.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Screen-Shot-2019-05-05-at-10.26.32-PM.png?fit=886%2C579&ssl=1",886,579,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/petersantilli.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Screen-Shot-2019-05-05-at-10.26.32-PM.png?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/petersantilli.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Screen-Shot-2019-05-05-at-10.26.32-PM.png?fit=300%2C196&ssl=1",300,196,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/petersantilli.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Screen-Shot-2019-05-05-at-10.26.32-PM.png?fit=768%2C502&ssl=1",768,502,true],"large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/petersantilli.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Screen-Shot-2019-05-05-at-10.26.32-PM.png?fit=886%2C579&ssl=1",886,579,true],"rpg_gallery_admin_thumb":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/petersantilli.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Screen-Shot-2019-05-05-at-10.26.32-PM.png?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1",150,150,true],"rpg_gallery_thumb":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/petersantilli.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Screen-Shot-2019-05-05-at-10.26.32-PM.png?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1",150,150,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/petersantilli.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Screen-Shot-2019-05-05-at-10.26.32-PM.png?fit=886%2C579&ssl=1",886,579,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/petersantilli.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Screen-Shot-2019-05-05-at-10.26.32-PM.png?fit=886%2C579&ssl=1",886,579,true]},"author_info":{"info":["Peter Santilli"]},"category_info":"Pete Santilli - Opinion<\/a>","tag_info":"Pete Santilli - Opinion","comment_count":"0","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/petersantilli.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Screen-Shot-2019-05-05-at-10.26.32-PM.png?fit=886%2C579&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/plD2r-12","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/petersantilli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/petersantilli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/petersantilli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/petersantilli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/petersantilli.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=64"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/petersantilli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":66,"href":"https:\/\/petersantilli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64\/revisions\/66"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/petersantilli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/65"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/petersantilli.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=64"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/petersantilli.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=64"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/petersantilli.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=64"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}