TEL AVIV — Islamic State gunmen in the Sinai Peninsula intercepted a shipment of rockets being smuggled into the Gaza Strip, Palestinian sources told i24News Arabic on Tuesday.
The shipment, likely bound for Hamas or Palestinian Islamic Jihad, contained dozens of missiles with ranges of 37 to 50 miles (60-80 km), capable of reaching central Israel from Gaza, the report said.
Operatives from the Islamic State (IS)’s Sinai Province seized the shipment after raiding a truck and another vehicle belonging to arms smugglers.
The rockets likely came from either Libya or Iran, the report cited sources as saying.
Since Egypt has destroyed most of the subterranean tunnels between Gaza and Sinai, Gaza-based terror groups have struggled to smuggle more weapons into the coastal enclave. Materials for the production of rockets have been smuggled in by sea.
Most of the Grad rockets belonging to Hamas and PIJ have a range of 37 miles.
Although they share a mutual hatred of Israel, there is no love lost between the Islamic State and Hamas — despite Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s 2014 proclamation that “Hamas is ISIS and ISIS is Hamas.”
Last week, Hamas blamed the Islamic State for explosions at two Hamas police checkpoints in Gaza City that left three officers dead.
A day later, Hamas launched mass arrests of Islamic State supporters within the Gaza Strip.
The Islamic State’s Sinai Province has chalked up a number of terror attacks, including blowing up a Russian jetliner in 2015, which claimed the lives of 224 people, and masterminding a 2017 attack on a mosque in northern Sinai that saw 311 killed.
Islamic State has also claimed responsibility for firing rockets into Israel.
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