Photo Credit: Tsafrir Abayov / Flash 90
Iron Dome anti-missile system.

The Iron Dome has been returned to southern Israel to protect civilians from Gaza rocket fire.

On Friday, the IDF again deployed arrays of the anti-missile batteries to defend the port city of Ashdod and the western Negev community of Netivot.

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The move follows two rounds of attacks launched two weeks in a row. The first week’s rockets were fired by the Iranian-backed Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror organization. One mid-range Grad Katyusha rocket landed in Gan Yavne, slightly east of Ashdod. One teenage girl was hospitalized due to trauma. Retaliation for the attack included air strikes on four targets in Gaza.

This week’s attack, however, was launched by a Salafi Muslim group linked to Al Qaeda or Da’esh (ISIS) – possibly the Army of Islam or Jabhat al Nusra. These groups are now vying for power and hoping to raise tensions between Israel and Gaza’s ruling Hamas terror organization, according to security sources.

“Even if last night’s shooting at Israel came from errant global jihad groups who wish to challenge Hamas by firing at us, we consider Hamas responsible for what happens in Gaza and we will not tolerate attempts to harm our citizens,” Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon said Thursday.

“The IDF views the incident with gravity,” an army spokesperson said in a statement following Wednesday’s attack. “The Hamas terrorist organization is the address and one upon whom the responsibility falls.”

Retaliation against Gaza for the rocket fire came in the form of a muted set of air strikes that took out a few empty terror bases in the enclave.

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Hana Levi Julian is a Middle East news analyst with a degree in Mass Communication and Journalism from Southern Connecticut State University. A past columnist with The Jewish Press and senior editor at Arutz 7, Ms. Julian has written for Babble.com, Chabad.org and other media outlets, in addition to her years working in broadcast journalism.