Hamas leader promises more violence unless Israel lifts blockade

Haniyeh threatened further escalation in the violence on the Israel-Gaza border if Israel’s blockade on the Gaza Strip is not lifted

By: World Israel News Staff

A top Hamas leader threatened further escalation in the violence on the Israel-Gaza border if Israel’s blockade on the Gaza Strip is not lifted.

Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh spoke on Sunday at the funeral of two Palestinian teenagers killed Saturday in an Israeli Air force (IAF) airstrike, claiming that the Palestinians “are on the road to victory.”

“The issue of Palestine, Jerusalem and Gaza is still on the top of our agenda. The solution to the situation in Gaza is to lift the siege. The Palestinian people do not believe in promises about projects. The people want to see real results that will bring an end to this siege,” he declared.

Israel imposed a blockade on Gaza, meant to stem Hamas’ military buildup, after the terror group seized power of the Strip in 2007.

Haniyeh vowed that “the weekly marches will continue until we’ve reached all of our goals, first and foremost: lifting the siege on Gaza. We’ll continue to march until the right of return is realized. We will not give up on returning to all the land of Palestine,” Ynet reported.

The weekly so-called March of Return, which began on March 30, has peaked in May and has since lost steam and participants. Only a few “marchers,” mostly Hamas terrorists in civilian clothes and poor Gazans paid to riot, arrive at Israel’s fence on Fridays.

Haniyeh lauded Hamas’ recent actions as a victory.

“Our enemy, which aspires to impose equations of the rules of confrontation, has encountered resistance. We say to everyone that the marches that have put our issue on the map will only become more intense. The assassinations, carried out by your [Israel’s] warplanes, will not happen again. These equations will not work again. Many elements were involved in mediating the ceasefire, but it was the word of the resistance that was the loudest,” he insisted.

Haniyeh made his fiery statements after an extremely violent weekend during which Gaza-based terrorists fired some 200 rockets at Israel, and in response, the Israeli Air Force (IAF) carried out the largest wave of daytime strikes against Hamas terror targets in Gaza since Operation Protective Edge in summer 2014, bombing some 40 terror targets.

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