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The Israeli Defence Minister, Benny Gantz has accused Iran of sending the Palestinian Islamic Jihad tens of millions of dollars a year. This comes following a three-day battle between the IDF and PIJ only last week.
Gantz accused Iran of using the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to transfer intelligence and smuggle material into Gaza, providing them tens of millions of dollars of funding to carry out terror attacks against Israel. The PIJ’s leadership is well known to frequently travel to Iran and during Operation Breaking Dawn last week, the PIJ’s secretary general, Ziad Nakhaleh, was in Iran meeting with the group’s supporters. Nakhaleh also met with Iran’s Foreign Minister and the commander of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), Hossein Salami, who pledged: “We are with you on this path until the end – and let Palestine and the Palestinians know that they are not alone”.
During a meeting between him and his Cypriot counterpart, he said: “While the world watched another escalation between Israel and Gaza, I stopped to emphasize: The Iranian ayatollahs are involved in this front. Islamic Jihad in Gaza is a violent Iranian proxy”.
Gantz has warned before he would act against the terror group’s leadership who are located abroad and he reiterated it again here, stating: “While quiet in the area was restored, we cannot rest. On the operational level — the State of Israel will maintain its freedom of action in all arenas”. Adding: “As I have said in the past, our eyes and targets focus on anyone who threatens the security of our citizens, from Khan Younis to Tehran”.
