Despite official claims from Gaza that no ISIS presence exists there, ISIS support among Gazans is growing on Twitter and YouTube.
Vocativ analysis of deep web chatter in ISIS forums suggests that the extremist Sunni organization, which has taken over roughly half of Iraq and threatens Assad in Syria, has ties with militant groups operating in Gaza.
While Hamas has dominated Gaza since 2005, dozens of rival Islamist factions operate in the strip. Over the past few weeks, two Salafist groups have pledged allegiance to ISIS and claimed responsibility for rocket fire into Israel. As Vocativ reported at the end of June, the group formerly known as Ansar Beit Al-Maqdis changed its name to Al Dalwa Al-Islamia—which translates to “The Islamic State.” A few days ago, on July 10, the group claimed to have fired a battery of rockets at the Israeli town of Bnei Netzarim...
...A second Salafist terror group, Ansar Al-Dalwa al-Islamia (“Supporters of the Islamic State”), boasted of its own rocket barrage one day earlier, on June 9. Neither claim of responsibility can be independently verified, however ISIS has published details about both instances of rocket fire on their forums, which is tantamount to a welcome-to-the-network embrace.























