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| From Gaza, an Array of Makeshift Rockets Packs a Counterpunch | From Gaza, an Array of Makeshift Rockets Packs a Counterpunch |
| (35 minutes later) | |
| JERUSALEM — The rockets are smuggled via ship and tunnel from Iran, Libya, Sudan and Syria and, increasingly, manufactured from water pipes and household items in what a senior Israeli intelligence officer called Gaza’s “high-tech” sector — about 70 makeshift factories staffed by 250 men and overseen by a few dozen engineers and chemists. | JERUSALEM — The rockets are smuggled via ship and tunnel from Iran, Libya, Sudan and Syria and, increasingly, manufactured from water pipes and household items in what a senior Israeli intelligence officer called Gaza’s “high-tech” sector — about 70 makeshift factories staffed by 250 men and overseen by a few dozen engineers and chemists. |
| And while these rockets rarely hit high-value targets and have not killed a single person — the vast majority are stopped by Israel’s Iron Dome system or explode in open fields — the sheer number fired by militants into Israel since July 8 has shaken Israeli society, offering a sobering counterpunch to its superior firepower. The rockets have reached far into the north, threatening the commercial center in Tel Aviv and beyond. | And while these rockets rarely hit high-value targets and have not killed a single person — the vast majority are stopped by Israel’s Iron Dome system or explode in open fields — the sheer number fired by militants into Israel since July 8 has shaken Israeli society, offering a sobering counterpunch to its superior firepower. The rockets have reached far into the north, threatening the commercial center in Tel Aviv and beyond. |
| “They judge their achievement not just by the number of casualties, but also by the harassment and the disruption to life they cause,” Uzi Rubin, a retired Israeli general and pre-eminent weapons expert, said of the militants. “A lucky hit can cause a lot of damage and casualties, and that could happen at any time.” | “They judge their achievement not just by the number of casualties, but also by the harassment and the disruption to life they cause,” Uzi Rubin, a retired Israeli general and pre-eminent weapons expert, said of the militants. “A lucky hit can cause a lot of damage and casualties, and that could happen at any time.” |
| The Israeli military estimates that Hamas — the Islamist movement that dominates Gaza — Islamic Jihad and other fighters had a combined arsenal of 10,000 imported and homemade rockets at the start of the latest conflagration, about double their cache at the end of the last battle, in 2012. Military officials said their intense bombing had destroyed a third to half of those weapons, which they said were mainly stored underground and fired from parking lots, apartment windows, mosque porches and schoolyards, or through trap doors that were quickly re-covered with soil or stones. | |
| The rockets are code-named for Palestinian militant heroes, and for their range: The R-160 honors Abdel Aziz Rantisi, a founder of Hamas, with a 160-kilometer, or 100-mile, reach from the Gaza Strip to the Israeli port city of Haifa. The J-80, able to hit Tel Aviv, memorializes Ahmed al-Jabari, a militant commander assassinated at the start of the last big battle. | The rockets are code-named for Palestinian militant heroes, and for their range: The R-160 honors Abdel Aziz Rantisi, a founder of Hamas, with a 160-kilometer, or 100-mile, reach from the Gaza Strip to the Israeli port city of Haifa. The J-80, able to hit Tel Aviv, memorializes Ahmed al-Jabari, a militant commander assassinated at the start of the last big battle. |
| The lone Israeli casualty was felled by a simple mortar. Still, Israel says it is the rocket fire that has prompted a military bombing campaign that has killed more than 235 Gazans, most of them civilians. | The lone Israeli casualty was felled by a simple mortar. Still, Israel says it is the rocket fire that has prompted a military bombing campaign that has killed more than 235 Gazans, most of them civilians. |
| But Osama Hamdan, a Lebanon-based Hamas leader, said on Israel Radio this week that the eradication effort was ultimately futile and that each spent or destroyed rocket could be easily replaced “within hours.” | |
| The first crude Qassam rockets, fired in 2001, barely cleared Gaza’s border. On the first day of the current fighting, a Syrian-made M-302 hit near Hadera, 70 miles north. | The first crude Qassam rockets, fired in 2001, barely cleared Gaza’s border. On the first day of the current fighting, a Syrian-made M-302 hit near Hadera, 70 miles north. |
| Though Gaza militants have declined to discuss specifics about their armaments, interviews with three high-ranking Israeli military officials and several Israeli experts provided a detailed portrait of that progression. Israel meticulously analyzes every rocket piece that falls in its territory, has intercepted dozens of weapons shipments, and devotes copious intelligence resources to scoping out the operation on the ground. | Though Gaza militants have declined to discuss specifics about their armaments, interviews with three high-ranking Israeli military officials and several Israeli experts provided a detailed portrait of that progression. Israel meticulously analyzes every rocket piece that falls in its territory, has intercepted dozens of weapons shipments, and devotes copious intelligence resources to scoping out the operation on the ground. |
| Ely Karmon of Israel’s International Institute for Counter-Terrorism said arms — and experts who trained the locals to use them — were imported from Hamas’s Shiite allies through the Mediterranean Sea and the Sinai Desert during the second Palestinian intifada in the early 2000s. Israel’s 2005 pullout from Gaza and Egypt’s subsequent closing of its Rafah border crossing spawned a network of underground tunnels, where, experts said, traffic reached its peak during the one-year presidency of Mohammed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood, a Hamas ally who was ousted by the Egyptian military. | Ely Karmon of Israel’s International Institute for Counter-Terrorism said arms — and experts who trained the locals to use them — were imported from Hamas’s Shiite allies through the Mediterranean Sea and the Sinai Desert during the second Palestinian intifada in the early 2000s. Israel’s 2005 pullout from Gaza and Egypt’s subsequent closing of its Rafah border crossing spawned a network of underground tunnels, where, experts said, traffic reached its peak during the one-year presidency of Mohammed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood, a Hamas ally who was ousted by the Egyptian military. |
| Though Egypt’s new government is hostile to Hamas and shut down hundreds of the tunnels, the Israelis say some smuggling continued, and local production picked up. | Though Egypt’s new government is hostile to Hamas and shut down hundreds of the tunnels, the Israelis say some smuggling continued, and local production picked up. |
| “Rocket production is one of the prosperous sectors of the Gaza Strip — there is a very organized array of research and development and production,” said the senior intelligence officer. “Technologically, we are speaking about very simple rockets. They are not accurate at all. They make them by using very simple raw materials, mostly.” | “Rocket production is one of the prosperous sectors of the Gaza Strip — there is a very organized array of research and development and production,” said the senior intelligence officer. “Technologically, we are speaking about very simple rockets. They are not accurate at all. They make them by using very simple raw materials, mostly.” |
| Materials like 6-, 9-, 10- and 12-inch water pipes. Filled with propellant mixed from fertilizer, oxidizer, ammonia perchlorate, aluminum powder and other ingredients. Capped by warheads shaped by ironworkers. Under the tutelage, in some cases, of moonlighting chemistry or physics professors. Instructions are also available on the Internet. | Materials like 6-, 9-, 10- and 12-inch water pipes. Filled with propellant mixed from fertilizer, oxidizer, ammonia perchlorate, aluminum powder and other ingredients. Capped by warheads shaped by ironworkers. Under the tutelage, in some cases, of moonlighting chemistry or physics professors. Instructions are also available on the Internet. |
| “You need to be an engineer, but it’s not too difficult to learn it,” said another military official. “After you have the basic design, after you have the specific plan, you can do it. You don’t need a huge factory to do it. You can do it in a garage, you can do it under a mosque.” | |
| On Wednesday, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency found 20 rockets stored at a vacant school. | On Wednesday, the United Nations Relief and Works Agency found 20 rockets stored at a vacant school. |
| During Israel’s eight-day battle with Gaza in 2012, militants fired only a handful of long-range rockets, and only on the final day. One hit an apartment building in Rishon Lezion, a populous seaside suburb, and others came close to Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. This time, rockets have been intercepted over Tel Aviv each day and have touched central Israel towns including Rehovot, Yavne, Ramle, Rishon and Nahariya. Jerusalem has been targeted half a dozen times. | During Israel’s eight-day battle with Gaza in 2012, militants fired only a handful of long-range rockets, and only on the final day. One hit an apartment building in Rishon Lezion, a populous seaside suburb, and others came close to Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. This time, rockets have been intercepted over Tel Aviv each day and have touched central Israel towns including Rehovot, Yavne, Ramle, Rishon and Nahariya. Jerusalem has been targeted half a dozen times. |
| By Thursday night, the military had counted 1,500 rockets fired from Gaza in 10 days. More than 1,100 landed in Israel. Iron Dome shot down nearly 300, a military spokesman said, about 85 percent of those that it had aimed at. The rest fell short, in Gaza or the sea. | |
| For years, most rockets were launched from northern Gaza, to maximize their reach. But during this conflict, a senior military official said Wednesday, about 30 percent have come from the northern town of Beit Lahiya; 25 percent from Gaza City; 17 or 18 percent from refugee camps in the strip’s midsection; 20 percent from Khan Younis, in the south; and less than 10 percent from Rafah. | For years, most rockets were launched from northern Gaza, to maximize their reach. But during this conflict, a senior military official said Wednesday, about 30 percent have come from the northern town of Beit Lahiya; 25 percent from Gaza City; 17 or 18 percent from refugee camps in the strip’s midsection; 20 percent from Khan Younis, in the south; and less than 10 percent from Rafah. |
| “We track the rocket trajectory, we track it back very accurately to the place it was launched from,” the official said. “If we see something on the ground, we bomb it. We usually don’t see anything on the ground because right after the launching the door will close. If it’s in a garden, it will be covered with mud.” | “We track the rocket trajectory, we track it back very accurately to the place it was launched from,” the official said. “If we see something on the ground, we bomb it. We usually don’t see anything on the ground because right after the launching the door will close. If it’s in a garden, it will be covered with mud.” |
| Mr. Karmon, the counterterrorism expert, said Hamas had unleashed more of its arsenal this time because “they are in the weakest position of any time in their history — from their point of view, they fight for life or death.” But he and others pointed out that militants had timed their use of long-range rockets for maximum effect, often during Israel’s evening news. | |
| “They are very parsimonious,” Mr. Karmon said. “They use it more as a psychological and political weapon. They keep most of these weapons in reserve for a decisive military moment, and this did not yet arrive.” | |
| “If we enter on the ground,” he added, “it will.” | “If we enter on the ground,” he added, “it will.” |