debkafile Reports: Gazan Palestinians shoot 23-missile barrage at Sderot Wednesday. Mayor Ellie Moyal resigns, accusing PM and military of abandoni

debkafile‘s military sources report that, between 8:00 and 10:00 a.m., Wednesday, Dec. 12, Palestinian terrorists in Gaza fired 23 Qassam missiles at the small town of Sderot, injuring a mothr and daughter and leaving many people in shock. The Iran-linked Jihad Islami claimed 11, leaving the remaining seven for other groups, including al Qaeda or the belligerent Resistance Committees.
Our sources stress that the onslaught underlines the bankruptcy of the Olmert government’s security policy in Israel’s southwestern Negev, due to its refusal to let the army root out the protracted peril hanging over its inhabitants.
1. The concentrated Palestinian missile assault was to be anticipated in reprisal for the Israel military counter-terror operation the day before in the Khan Younes sector of the southern Gaza Strip. Yet it was not averted.
2. Jihad Islami signaled that, although it took casualties Tuesday, it is capable of retaliating swiftly to an Israeli military operation.
3. Israel’s in-and-out operation was officially boosted as a major offensive, whereas it barely scratched the surface of the war machine Hamas and its allies are building in the Gaza Strip.
4. The IDF’s hands are tied by the government in Jerusalem and the chief of staff Lt. Gen. Gaby Ashkenazi. The troops are not allowed to fight to the finish the war waged over the Gaza-Israel border fence. Day by day, therefore, the Palestinians are gaining.
Inevitably, as long as this policy of restraint is sustained, the Palestinian terrorist groups remain free to terrorize Israeli locations while constantly expanding the range of their missiles to reach more Israeli towns.
Tuesday, an IDF tank-APC force drove into the southern Gaza Strip to curb missile and mortar fire. Six armed Palestinians, most of them Jihad Islami, were killed and about 20 wanted terrorists detained. Four soldiers were slightly injured when heavy Palestinian anti-tank and RPG fire hit their tank and several vehicles. Engineering, armored and air units were brought in to recover the crippled tank as the Palestinians hurled explosive devices and shelled them with mortars.