ISIS Promises to Be a 'Thorn in the Throat of Hamas' and Israel
Tuesday, June 30, 2015 09:51 PM
By: Cathy Burke
Islamic State (ISIS) jihadists are setting their sites on Hamas, vowing in a new video that they'll "uproot" the Islamist terrorist organization in Gaza and install their own rule over the Palestinian enclave.
The Jerusalem Post reports the video appears to have been filmed in Syria, with militants accusing Hamas of "not being serious in all things related to the implementation of Islamic law" – and promising "what is today occurring in Syria and in the Yarmuk refugee camp, will happen in Gaza," referring to a Damascus district founded by Palestinian refugees.
Hamas is being challenged by dissenting terror cells in Gaza – some of whom have pledged allegiance to ISIS – and one analyst tells The New York Times their ranks have swelled from several hundred a few years ago to a few thousand among Gaza’s 1.8 million residents.
Like the self-styled caliphate, who control land in Iraq, Syria, the Sinai and Libya, the jihadist challengers to Hamas oppose the group's negotiations with Israel and its reconciliation with the Palestinian Authority in the West Bank.
"God willing, we will uproot the Jewish state," says one masked fighter in the video, "as well as Hamas, the Palestinian Liberation Organization and all of the secularists," the Jerusalem Post reports.
The Guardian reports the video statement is a rare public challenge to Hamas. But a spokesman for the rival terror cells in Gaza suggest it's just the start.
"We will stay like a thorn in the throat of Hamas, and a thorn in the throat of Israel,"said Abu al-Ayna al-Ansari, the spokesman for the groups tells The Times.
Ansari said the militants had formed a decision-making council for their group, Supporters of the Islamic State, and created a militant wing, the Battalion of Sheikh Omar Hadid.
http://www.newsmax.com/World/Newsfront/ISIS-video-install-rule/2015/06/30/id/652962/
