Skip to main content

Gaza factions limit cellphone use to avoid Israeli assassinations

Hamas and Islamic Jihad have instructed their members to minimize their use of cellphones, as they are monitored by Israel to pinpoint assassination targets.
A Palestinian tunnel worker uses his mobile as he rests inside a smuggling tunnel beneath the Gaza-Egypt border in the southern Gaza Strip July 19, 2013. The Islamist group Hamas appealed to Egypt's new rulers on Thursday not to pursue its destruction of smuggling tunnels into the Gaza Strip, warning they risked throttling the small Palestinian territory. REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa (GAZA - Tags: POLITICS TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY) - RTX11ROK
Read in 

GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — Israel is tracking Hamas members' movements via their mobile phones and using their "voiceprint" to carry out assassinations, according to reports from the Gaza Strip. Mobile phones are considered Israeli intelligence's most successful tool for tracking the movements of Gaza's various resistance factions. This comes at the end of a year of successive blows delivered by both Hamas security services and the resistance factions against Israeli spies and collaborators.

An official security source told Al-Monitor that there were cases in which resistance members were tracked and then assassinated through the use of mobile phones.

Access the Middle East news and analysis you can trust

Join our community of Middle East readers to experience all of Al-Monitor, including 24/7 news, analyses, memos, reports and newsletters.

Subscribe

Only $100 per year.