The Jerusalem Post reports: “Claiming that Hamas has jumped light years since Israel's disengagement from Gaza, a high-ranking IDF officer said that there was currently a limited window of opportunity for Israel to confront the Hamas threat in the Gaza Strip.
‘There is an opportunity today since the world has not yet become accustomed to the new Hamas entity, and Hamas has not yet fully completed strengthening it's military capabilities,’ the officer said, adding that Israel was on a ‘collision course’ with the Islamist group.
‘The Gaza Strip is a boiling pot, the fire underneath is fueled by [a poor] economy and [an Islamist ideology] and the lid over it is Israel,’ the officer was quoted as saying by Israel Radio. ‘Hamas is currently not acting against Israel because it is not in the group's interests, but one must not mistake this with the organization's ultimate goals,’ he added.
The Egyptians, the Americans and the Europeans, the officer said, could not be counted on by Israel to stop Hamas.
The IDF Southern Command has operational military plans for Hamas in the Gaza Strip, and recently conducted several weeks of training for infantry, armor, and engineering units, said the officer. He added that recent operations in Gaza along the border were aimed at preventing Hamas and Islamic Jihad operatives from planting bombs and digging tunnels in the area, but he said that these operations had not yet dealt with the foundations of terror in Gaza…”

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