Iran has been trying to re-arm Hamas during Operation Protective Edge, a senior Israeli official said on Tuesday. According to the official, Iran, which is more closely aligned with the Islamic Jihad terrorist group, is making efforts to improve its relations with Hamas. Relations between Hamas and Iran soured when Hamas aligned itself with the Sunni rebels in the Syrian civil war, against the Iranian-backed Syrian regime and its Lebanese Shiite ally Hezbollah. The official said that Hamas' rocket stockpiles have dwindled and Hamas has "only a few dozen" rockets remaining with a range longer than 45 kilometers (28 miles). So far during Operation Protective Edge, there have been five or six attempts to fire rockets at Israel from the Sinai Peninsula, but all were foiled by Egyptian security forces, the official said.
