A terrorist group linked to al-Qaeda has claimed responsibility for setting the fire in the Israeli city of Haifa that raged across the city and forced some 75,000 people out of their homes to seek safety.
The U.K. Independent reported:
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An al-Qaeda linked militant group has claimed responsibility for starting a devastating fire in the Israeli city of Haifa that forced tens of thousands of people to flee their homes.
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Ma’sadat al-Mujahideen, a Palestinian Salafist group, has claimed to be behind several previous blazes in Israel, including the Mount Carmel forest fire that killed more than 40 people near Haifa in 2010.
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There is no proof of the group’s involvement in the blaze, or others they claimed near Jerusalem in 2011 and in the American state of Nevada in the following year.
A previous statement from Ma’sadat al-Mujahideen demanded that Jewish people “return from whence they came since they have no place among us”, threatening to continue arson attacks in Israel and among the country’s allies.
Terrorism monitors at the Jamestown Foundation said the group’s claims were “questionable” but that it was fixated on the use of fire as a weapon of jihad.
At least 16 people have been arrested across Israel and the West Bank on suspicion of arson after fires were started across the region near Israeli homes and settlements.
The fires come amid heightened tensions in Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories over more than a year of stabbing and car-ramming attacks by Palestinians and responding security crackdowns by Israeli forces.
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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said of the fires: “Every fire that was caused by arson, or incitement to arson, is terrorism by all accounts. And we will treat it as such.”
“Whoever tries to burn parts of Israel will be punished for it severely,” Netanyahu added.
Netanyahu visited an air base and met with pilots that were tasked with putting out the fires. He said of the fires: “There are elements of terror here, of that there is no doubt.”
Officials say the fires that have raged across the country are the work of arsonists in more than 50 of the cases, The Times of Israel reported.
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Education Minister Naftali Bennet, who leads the right-wing Jewish Home Party, tweeted about those who set the fires: “Only those to whom the country does not belong are capable of burning it.”
Internal security minister Gilad Erdan echoed Netanyahu’s statement that the cases of arson were acts of terror: “There is no difference between arson and incitement to commit terrorism.”
Thankfully no serious injuries or deaths have been reported as a result of the blazes, but dozens of individuals have been treated for smoke inhalation and hundreds of homes have been damaged as the fires tear across the country.
Thank God no one has died or been seriously injured, and hopefully the terrorists responsible will be brought to justice. God bless the Israelis as they work to put out the fires, rebuild and bring those responsible to justice.
