During the early hours of Thursday morning, Jan. 16, five rockets were fired from Gaza into Israel. The rockets set off the Tzeva Adom Code Red Alert sirens along the western edge of Israel’s borders.

The Iron Dome defense system intercepted the five rockets, while one additional rocket landed in an empty field.  The rockets were aimed at or near the Israeli city of Ashkelon.

No injuries were reported.

This most recent round of rockets started on Monday when the Gazans decided to send a farewell barrage to former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon who was laid to rest at his Sycamore Ranch in the Negev on that day.

The IAF retaliated for the rocket launches by striking four terror infrastructure sites in northern Gaza.

The new railway station in rocket-battered Sderot in southern Israel now is one of the safest places in town following its opening Tuesday afternoon.

The terminal was built with special reinforcements to protect passengers from Kassam rockets, thousands of which have exploded in the small city since the Oslo War, otherwise known as the Second Intifada, which broke out in 2000 and escalated with Israel’s expulsion of Jews and withdrawal of the IDF from nearby Gaza in 2005.

Sderot now is the southern tip of the rail line that extends from Tel Aviv to Ashkelon, and tracks are being built to sonnet it with Be’er Sheva.

Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu attended Tuesday’s ceremony opening the station and declared that Sderot now is a”suburb of Tel Aviv.”

Israel Air Force aircraft targeted two concealed rocket launchers in northern Gaza early Thursday afternoon after terrorists in Hamas-controlled Gaza attacked with two mortar shells , one on Wednesday and one Thursday morning.

“Launching rockets against Israel and its civilians is a breach of our sovereignty,” said  IDF Spokesman Lt. Col. Peter Lerner.

As usual, the IDF added,” We maintain the right to operate against those who are involved in terror.”

Some Palestinian speaker detailing his view on negotiations over “Palestine,” and meanwhile offers a very good and reliable plan for Israel to deal with his kind. Just change the name to “Israel” and act accordingly, the situation would be resolved in under a day.

As a good friend of mine pit it, once you place yourself outside the law, you cannot continue to receive protection from the same law. This is a superb example of this axiom.

Last night, after someone in Lebanon shot four Katyusha rockets at Naharia, I expected a couple of IAF wings to get over to South Lebanon and return a large swath of land to the 12th century. Instead, we saw a proportionate response, an attack on some target south of Beirut which killed no one and didn’t even damage property.

We need to appoint this Palestinian man as our prime minister and follow whatever he says – except apply it to the enemy. Trust me, we will be immeasurably successful.

Oh – and watch the two Neturei Karta guys with the anti-Zionist sign. Do they recognize a pogrom in the making? I wonder.

Originally published at Gatestone Institute.

The dramatic escalation in Egypt’s domestic conflict between the Muslim Brotherhood and the military is being accompanied by an upsurge in the activities of jihadi organizations in the Sinai Peninsula.

Since Morsi’s ouster, extremist Salafi and jihadi organizations have launched waves of attacks on Egyptian security forces, and provoked this week’s extensive counter-terrorism operation by the Egyptian army.

These Al-Qaeda-affiliated forces are also seeking to strike Israel — both to satisfy their ideological demand for jihad against Israelis, and to try and force Israel and Egypt into a confrontation, thereby undermining the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty.

The Israel Defense Forces are therefore on high alert in the event of further attacks by terrorists in Egypt, while also facing the dilemma of how to safeguard its own national security without infringing on Egyptian sovereignty at this most sensitive time.

Two unprecedented incidents on the southern border in just the last few days, however, served as markers for the rapidly changing situation.

First, according to international media reports, an Israeli drone struck an Al-Qaeda-affiliated organization in Sinai, as it was making final preparations to fire rockets at Israel.

While Israeli defense officials have not confirmed or denied the reports, if true, they represent the first preemptive counter-terrorism strike on Egyptian soil.

If Israeli intelligence receives word of an imminent attack taking shape in Sinai, with little time to coordinate a response with Egyptian military forces, such action might be expected.

Islamists across Egypt were quick to seize on the incident to accuse the Egyptian military of being complicit in an Israeli breach of Egyptian sovereignty.

Although this incident was quickly forgotten by Egyptians as both Egypt proper and Sinai descended into turmoil, there is evidence that further attacks by Sinai terrorists against both Egyptian security forces and Israel are being planned.

An additional signal of the deteriorating security situation in Sinai was the rocket fired by a terrorist organization at the Red Sea tourist resort city of Eilat over the weekend.

Anticipating the attack, the IDF stationed an Iron Dome anti-rocket battery in the city. The prior preparation paid off: the system fired an interceptor that successfully stopped the rocket from hitting the city.

The rocket failed to hurt anyone, but it did trigger an air-raid siren and frighten tourists, sending them scatting for cover. Unlike the cities of Ashdod and Ashkelon, which are used to Palestinian rocket terrorism, Eilat, a resort town, is not used to living under rocket fire.

Today, a shadow of uncertainty hangs over the future of the city’s tourist industry. For now, Israeli visitors to the city are displaying trademark resilience, and are continuing to pack the city’s hotels and beaches.

Nearby, however, the IDF continues on high alert, watching every suspicious movement in the desert sands near the Egyptian border for signs of the next attack.

Weeks after the Iranian government had announced it was building new launch bases for its domestic satellite program, newly published pictures of one such site have led analysts to conclude it was designed to test ballistic missiles rather than launch space rockets, the Daily Telegraph reported.

The new site is close to Iran’s first space center in the northern Semnan province. A picture of the base published by IHS Jane’s Military and Security Assessments shows a 70 ft. tall launch tower sitting on a 600 by 420 ft. launch pad. The picture also shows a 375 ft. long exhaust deflector.

The Telegraph quotes analysts who say they base their speculation on the fact that the unfinished site, located 25 miles south east of the city of Shahrud, does not include a storage facility for the liquid rocket fuel which is used in the Iranian space program. This would suggest that the base is being built for ballistic missiles, which use solid fuel.

Matthew Clements, who edited these assessments, said: “This site could be a facility for launching satellites into orbit. However, Iran is already building at least one other site for this purpose and, looking at the satellite imagery we have got, we believe that this facility is most likely used for testing ballistic missiles. Its location and orientation would be suitable for long-range missile tests as they would fly over Iranian territory for 870 miles, meaning large quantities of flight data could be gathered before they drop into the Indian Ocean.”

“At the same time,” Clements added, “we can’t see any storage facilities for the liquid fuel needed for the rockets that launch satellites, suggesting it will be used for solid-fuel ballistic missiles.”

He also said there was no indication that the base was a nuclear facility.

In July, Iranian Minister of Communication and Information Technology Mohammad Hassan Nami announced that Iran is planning to launch several new space centers to “monitor and observe different space objects and satellites passing through the country’s atmosphere,” and introduced the new space center in Semnan province.

“We are building other centers too and we are trying to have a powerful start,” he added.

But if the entire project turns out to be a ruse intended to hide Iran’s efforts to produce a missile with the range to hit Tel-Aviv, it would be the first time such a ruse was attempted using a monkey.

In January, Iran’s Aerospace Industries announced that it has sent a monkey into space on the back of Pishgam (Pioneer) explorer rocket, and that the monkey came back.

Aerospace Industries said it was planning to send humans into space.

But Shashank Joshi, a research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute who has written about the Iranian missile program, told the Telegraph Iran’s actual plans are far more sinister: “We often talk about Iran’s nuclear program,” Joshi said, “but what really spooks countries in the region is the ballistic missiles that could act as a delivery system.”

He said Iran had been laboring to develop solid fuel rockets which are quicker to deploy than liquid fuel versions. He commented: “If you look at why their missile program has been so slow, one reason is their difficulties with solid fuel. A testing site which helps in that regard is concerning. Testing is critical. You don’t improve missiles until you test them.”

As Israel begins talks with the Palestinian Authority, two rockets launched from Gaza hit Israel on Tuesday morning.

The rockets fell in open areas, and no damage or injuries were reported.

Two Syrian rebels crossed over into the Golan on Tuesday night. The IDF now believes that it was Syrian army soldiers who simultaneously opened fire at the IDF patrol, from across the border. The IDF soldiers shot back at the source of the fire. No IDF soldiers were injured in the attack. The status of the two Syrians who crossed over is currently unknown.

In addition, 6 mortars, launched from Syria, hit the Israeli side of the Golan today, and another 20 landed near the border.

At least one false alarm was heard this evening, in or near the town of Katzrin on the Golan.