Palestinians 'preparing' for Israeli strike on Iran

JERUSALEM – The Palestinian Authority has told its intelligence and security agencies to study the consequences of an Israeli strike against Iran's nuclear facilities, WND has learned.

The PA directed its intelligence agencies to prepare a study detailing the effect an Israeli strike on Iran would have on so-called Palestinian refugees in Iraq, Lebanon and Syria, according to Palestinian security sources.

The sources said PA agencies also were told to prepare a security contingency plan for dealing with Iranian retaliation against Israel that would include Hamas and other Islamic groups launching attacks against Israel from both the Gaza Strip and the PA-patrolled West Bank.

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"Among other things, the PA is studying how to get refugees out of Lebanon if Israel retaliates there against Hezbollah," said one security source.

Israel has long feared that any strike on Iran would result in counterattacks against the Israeli home front by Iranian proxies, including Hezbollah to the north and Hamas in Gaza toward the south.

Also, there is concern Syria could get involved in any such conflict. Syria is in a military alliance with Iran, although the Obama administration has been trying to woo Syria away from the Iranian axis with little progress.

Syria has advanced missiles and rockets that can blanket every part of Israel, while Hezbollah has rearmed itself with tens of thousands of rockets and missiles since Israel's 2006 war that targeted Hezbollah in Lebanon.

The news of the PA preparing a response to a possible Israeli strike on Iran came as Hezbollah's second-in-command, Naim Kassem, claimed in an interview published yesterday that his group has a "large and precise" list of Israeli targets to attack if a war breaks out.

"We now hold a large and precise bank of Israeli targets, and Israel will have to pay the price for any step it takes," Kassem said to the An-Nahar newspaper, according to Agence France-Presse.

"Hezbollah has worked to develop its readiness to rise to the challenge should it arise, and we can safely say that in the past four years we have prepared ourselves far more than Israel has," he said.

Kassem denied Hezbollah is seeking a fight.

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"That does not mean that war is near," he said.