Israel Watch: Hamas Fired Rocket From Gaza Hits Abandoned Israeli Pre-School & IDF Retaliates Hitting Terror Targets in Gaza

A Rocket fired from the Gaza Strip on Friday night exploded outside a preschool in the border town of Sderot, causing damage to the property.

There were no direct casualties in the attack.

An earlier rocket exploded in an open area in the Sha’ar HaNegev region, causing no damage.

The launches set off warning sirens throughout Sderot as well as other communities in the area.

Residents then reported hearing two loud explosions.

Channel 2 News said several people in the vicinity of the Sderot impact site suffered from shock.

It was the first rocket attack reported in June. Earlier in the month Hamas test-fired dozens of short-range rockets in Gaza, with Israeli sources estimating that at least 30 projectiles were launched.

Those rockets were aimed at areas not under Israeli control,

Israel has seen sporadic fire from the Gaza Strip, usually claimed by small Salafi groups engaged in a power struggle with the Hamas terror group, which is the de facto ruler of the strip.

Israel has said repeatedly that it views Hamas as solely responsible for such attacks. It regularly responds to rocket-fire with airstrikes on Hamas targets.

Read the Original Article at Times of Israel

Israel raids 4 sites that are ‘components of Hamas’s operational infrastructure’ in Strip

The Israeli Air Force attacked targets belonging to terror groups in the Gaza Strip early Saturday morning, the IDF said, hours after a rocket fired from the coastal enclave landed outside a preschool in the border town of Sderot, causing damage but no injuries.

The four Gaza sites included a workshop, two locations of Hamas’s armed wing and a military training site for Islamic Jihad, a Gaza security official said on condition of anonymity. There were no reports of casualties.

Two of the sites were in Gaza City, while two were in the northern town of Beit Lahiya. All of the sites have been previously targeted by Israel, the official said.

The IDF said in a statement it had “targeted four locations that were components of Hamas’s operational infrastructure in the northern and central Gaza Strip.”

Read the Remainder at Times of Israel

Examining Terrorist Tactics: Hezbollah Develops New Skills in Syria

When Hezbollah first intervened on the side of President Bashar al-Assad in Syria, Israeli defense analysts saw the foray as a blessing – better to have their Lebanese arch-enemy entangled in a war in Syria. But there is increasing concern that Hezbollah is getting valuable battlefield experience in Syria, especially when it comes to large-scale, coordinated offensive operations, something the Shi’ite militia had little knowledge of before.

That practical experience could be of use in any subsequent conflict with Israel. Hezbollah commanders acknowledge the benefits.

“In some ways, Syria is a dress rehearsal for our next war with Israel,” a special forces Hezbollah commander admitted to VOA recently.

Peacetime training is no substitute for wartime experience, says John Capello, a former U.S. air attaché in Tel Aviv and now an analyst with the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, a Washington foreign policy think tank.

“NATO makes a big effort to make training as realistic as possible but it is still scripted and doesn’t teach how to deal with the unexpected. It just isn’t the same as the real thing.”

Hezbollah has been in the vanguard of large assaults on Syrian rebels and not just along the border in Qalamoun and Quneitra but also further afield around Aleppo in northern Syria.

Anti-Assad rebel commanders estimate that 80 percent of the ground forces the Assad regime has deployed since the Russian bombing campaign was launched in September 2015 have not consisted of Syrians but are made up of Hezbollah and Iranian fighters along with Shi’ite volunteers from Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Read the Remainder at Global Security