Hamas says it was not involved in recent rocket launches, has policy of only carrying out attacks from inside Palestine

Ma'an -- Hamas' armed wing the Al-Qassam Brigades released a statement late Thursday night attesting total non-involvement with the Monday rocket launches that hit Eilat and Aqaba.

"Military acts from the resistance are carried out inside of Palestine," spokesman of the brigades Abu Obeida said, added in a statement that also welcomed "any resistance targeting the occupation, whether from in our outside of Palestine."

Abu Obeida said that if fighters had launched the Monday rockets "toward Umm Ar-Rashrash [Eilat], than the brigades would not have been afraid of announcing the attacks as soon as they were carried out."

The spokesman said the fighters had a strict polity of "not using the lands of any state to carry out our military attacks, the borders of our acts are inside historical Palestine."

Accusations against Hamas to justify planned Israeli war

In throwing suspicion on Hamas for the launch of some seven rockets from the northern Sinai, which hit in the Red Sea port towns of Eilat, Israel, and Aqaba, Jordan, Abu Obeida said Israel was "attempting to export a crisis and justify their planned attack against Gaza."

The Hamas spokesman warned Arab nations away from the Israeli accusations, adding that "any party who lines up with Israel on this is participating in the Israeli aggression."