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Hamas a spectator in latest Gaza-Israel clash

Hamas allowed Islamic Jihad to fire rockets at Israel in the vain hope Egypt would communicate directly with Gaza's rulers to restore the cease-fire.
An Islamic Jihad militant stands guard near a military base that was targeted in an Israeli air strike in Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip March 13, 2014. Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip fired rockets at Israeli cities on Thursday in the second day of a cross-border flare-up that has drawn Israeli warnings of a tough military response. The Israeli military carried out 29 air strikes and fired tank shells at militant targets in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday after the Islamic Jihad group launched
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GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip — The firing of dozens of rockets from the Gaza Strip toward surrounding Israeli towns on March 12, and the negotiations that took place between Egyptian mediators and the perpetrator of the attacks, Islamic Jihad, to reinstate the cease-fire, has raised eyebrows in Hamas.

In most of its statements, Islamic Jihad’s leadership tried to portray its so-called “Breaking the Silence” operation, in which it fired rockets from Gaza, as having occurred in coordination with Hamas, and not as a result of a unilateral decision on its part. Islamic Jihad Secretary-General Ramadan Abdullah Shalah told Al Mayadeen TV on March 13 that there was “communication and coordination with [other] Palestinian factions, particularly Hamas, in relation to the situation and to find the best way to manage the battle, in light of the plight of our people, and the situation in the besieged Gaza Strip.”

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