

TEL AVIV – Marking a significant development in Middle East affairs, 100 jihadist fighters in the Gaza Strip associated with the ultra-conservative Salafi movement of Sunni Islam have pledged their allegiance to ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, a Salafist jihadi source in Gaza told WND.

Reached by cell phone in Gaza, Abu Al-Ayna al-Ansari, a leader of the main Salafi jihadist group in the Gaza Strip, had no comment on the report.

The Salafi sources say the covenants were made in private and mark a serious step toward the establishment of organic ISIS connections in Gaza.

Various Salafi Palestinian offshoots in Gaza have hesitated to officially declare themselves part of ISIS, instead preferring to say they were allied with ISIS ideology. However, even their written statements and videos have brandished the ISIS flag.

Salafis in Gaza have launched a series of attacks against Hamas in recent months, complaining Gaza’s Hamas rulers are not Islamic enough.

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The attacks include the roadside bombing of Hamas and Islamic Jihad vehicles last month and a series of attacks against Hamas targets in May, including the attempted bombing of a Hamas police headquarters. The campaign led to a violent Hamas crackdown on Salafi organizations in Gaza.

In June, the Information Bureau of the Aleppo Province, affiliated with ISIS, released a video titled “A message to our folks in Jerusalem” in which ISIS members originally from Gaza declared war on both Israel and Hamas.

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In the video, Abu Azzam Al-Ghazzawim, who hails originally from Gaza, sent a message to what he called the “tyrants of Hamas."

“You are nothing in our reckoning. You, Fatah and all the secularists, we count you as nothing. Allah willing, we shall uproot the state of the Jews. You are nothing but froth that will be gone as we move in. Allah willing, Gaza will be governed by Shariah despite you,” he stated.

Abu Qatadah Al-Filistini (Palestinian Abu Qatadah), an ISIS member who leads a faction in Aleppo, Syria, was on video calling on all “monotheists in Gaza to join the convoy of the Muhajidin and to join the State of the Caliphate.”

Abu Qatadah further accused Hamas of “sliding gradually into apostasy, a slide that started with the demolition of the Ibn Taymiyah Mosque.”

“It is a movement that does not seek to govern according to Shariah but seeks to appease Iran and America, the heads of apostasy.”

WND reported only a week earlier that Hamas' political leadership had tentatively accepted the terms of an eight-year truce with Israel.

The report came from sources within Hamas who told WND Israel gave support to Egypt to accept a Hamas delegation for further talks on the proposed long-term cease-fire.

After discussions in Egypt, the Hamas delegation, headed by Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, will travel to Qatar and Turkey for more input on the deal, which is being brokered by former Quartet envoy and ex-British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

The Hamas sources said the current version of the truce, as accepted in theory by Hamas' politburo, includes a Hamas pledge to stop all rocket fire from Gaza and to cease digging tunnels into Israel.

Hamas also agreed not to operate within 30 meters of the Israeli border, the sources said.

In return, the Hamas sources said, Israel agreed to allow thousands of Palestinians from Gaza to enter the Jewish state for work, a detail that cannot be confirmed with Israeli diplomatic sources.

The Hamas sources said Israel will allow for a larger "fishing zone" off the Gaza coast along with a corridor to connect the Gaza coastline to international waters. Israel, however, would still monitor and inspect ships in the area.