debkafile’s military sources: Mahmoud Abbas’s Fatah terrorist arm, al Aqsa Brigades has got hold of new 207mm Katyusha rockets

The menacing Russian-made rocket, which the Palestinian terrorists have dubbed Aqsa 2 or Aqsa 207, arrived in the Gaza Strip last week through northern Sinai. It extends the range of Palestinian rocket fire from the Gaza Strip to a maximum of 16-18 kilometers. Well within this range are Ashkelon and its port, power and oil pipeline installations, as well as the southern Israeli towns of Ofakim and Netivot.
Al Aqsa Brigades have furthermore put into service short-range, 8-kilometer Arafat 1 and Arafat 2 rockets. Some 20 are reported to have been fired till now against Israeli locations across the Gaza border.
While the rockets are “imported”, the launchers are assembled at Fatah foundries in the Gaza Strip.
The war materiel is smuggled in from Sinai – either through illicit tunnels running under the border or openly under the eye of the Egyptian border units. Last Saturday, Feb. 11, a tunnel linking the Rafah terminal with the Gaza sea shore caved in killing three Fatah operatives who were trapped inside. It was sealed by Palestinian security teams last year straight after Israel’s pull-out from the border region, but like the rest of the sealed tunnels it is under restoration to be reactivated for a new surge of weapons smuggling.
The Fatah armed group is stepping up its missile-rocket offensive against Israel, anxious to prove to the Palestinian population that despite their party’s crushing defeat by Hamas in last month’s election, the al Aqsa Brigades is still a military force to be reckoned with and capable of spearheading the war against Israel.