Former Gush Katif Leader: Let Us return To Gaza
One of the pioneering resident farmers of the Jewish communities of the Gaza Strip uprooted in 2005 says she has a solution for the current Gaza conflict: Reestablish Gush Katif, the ex-Jewish neighborhoods of Gaza.
Anita Tucker, a founder of Netzer Hazani, the first of the 23 towns of Gush Katif, said during a radio interview Sunday that not only is she ready to move back to Gaza, she believes about 90 percent of Katif’s nearly 8,700 former residents would enlist to return.
Further, Tucker contended if the Israeli government would allow Gush Katif to be reconstructed in Gaza, there would be lines of Israelis waiting to move there.
Tucker is currently a community leader who has helped keep most of the former Katif residents living together in towns outside Gaza.
“The only answer is for us to go back and start over again,” said Tucker, addressing the Hamas rocket fire from the Gaza Strip.
Tucker made her comments on “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio” on New York’s AM 970 The Answer.
“Of course,” she added, “the first thing that has to be done is to rid the area of those who want to kill us.”
Does Israel Have A Tunnel Problem On Its Northern Border?
Israel, at great cost, believes it has destroyed the complex tunnel network built by Hamas to smuggle arms and other contraband into Gaza and send suicide bombers into the Jewish state, but the possible existence of a similar and perhaps even greater underground system remains a threat to its national security.
The Israeli government is quietly concerned that the Iranian-backed Hizbullah organization has excavated tunnels that snake under the Jewish state’s northern communities in the Golan Heights.
A Hizbullah tunnel network under Israel could mirror or even dwarf the Hamas terrorist tunnels in the county’s south, along the Gaza Strip border.
Such tunnels could enable Hizbullah to carry out threats to use commandos to storm northern Israeli communities in an attempt to hold positions within the country.
After Israel’s nearly month-long military campaign in Gaza aimed in large part at destroying Hamas’s tunnels, Israeli officials seem careful to avoid publicly addressing the potential of Hizbullah tunnels.
A spokesman for the Israel Defense Forces declined to comment to this reporter on Hizbullah’s possible tunneling in the north.
The Shiite terrorist organization is known for its vast, sophisticated tunnel networks in Lebanon.
Indeed, Hizbullah taught Hamas its tunnel-warfare tactics and helped supervise the construction of its network.
It therefore must be assumed Hizbullah has at least attempted to tunnel under Israel in the north. The organization may not have drilled any openings into Israeli cities yet, however, fearing discovery or retaliation from Israel.
Northern Israeli residents have for years reported hearing drilling sounds underground. However, the Israeli military has said it has not discovered any tunnels.
Last week, the mayor of Kiryat Shmona, a city near Israel’s border with Lebanon, reportedly asked the IDF to investigate the possibility of Hizbullah tunnels.
Asked by KleinOnline for more information on the Hizbullah tunnel threat, an Israeli security source speaking on background said there is fear that after the Gaza conflict Hizbullah will attempt to convert its defensive tunnels into offensive networks that can snake under Israel.
The source said that while no tunnels were yet discovered under Israeli towns, the working assumption is that Hizbullah will attempt to tunnel there.
The source said Hizbullah is bogged down with the ongoing insurgency targeting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in Syria and that Israel does not believe Hizbullah wants a direct conflict with the Jewish state any time soon.