Hamas terror chief Khaled Meshal and Iran’s President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad met in Iran on Sunday, February 1, 2009.

Iranian ‘Supreme Leader’ Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei told Meshal in Tehran that “the Islamic resistance (Hamas) should be prepared for any possible situation, including a fresh war in Gaza,” according to Iran’s state-controlled media outlet, Fars.

Last Spring, Iran promised the Hamas terrorist group advanced missiles, other weapons, financial support, and military training.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert promised that if Hamas continued its Gaza-based deadly rocket attacks on Israel, the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) would respond with ‘disproportionate’ force.


After a cabinet meeting Sunday morning, Olmert stated that:

The Cabinet’s position from the outset was that if firing continues against residents of the South, there would be a sharp Israeli response that would be disproportional vis-a-vis the firing at residents of the State of Israel and at our forces. We will not go back to the rules of the game that the terrorist organizations tried to dictate in the past. We will act according to new rules that will ensure that we are not dragged into an unending shooting war on the southern border that denies southern residents a normal life.

Meanwhile, IDF Military Intelligence Chief Amos Yadlin believes that Hamas is currently acting in a defensive posture, concluding that the terrorist group “has been deterred, and is honoring the ceasefire, but is not deterring [other terrorist groups] enough.”

Former Lt. General Thomas McInerney told the Jerusalem Post that Israel was “too restrained and could have gone deeper into Gaza.”

According to the Israeli Defense Forces, Amir Mansi, the commander of the Hamas rocket launching program in the Gaza City area, was killed on Saturday, January 20, 2009 by IDF fire with assistance of the Shin Bet a/k/a Shabak, the Israeli Security Agency.

Mansi was also the leading Hamas authority on the terrorist group’s Grad long range missile launching program.

According to the IDF, Mansi directed and actively fired dozens of rockets at Israel, killing and wounding Israeli civilians. Mansi was spotted firing a rocket in the Jabal al-Rais area during a ground force operation today. The forces opened fire, killing Mansi and injuring two additional terror operatives.