Friday, June 6, 2008 CNSNews.com:

An Israeli human rights organization is threatening to sue the only Israeli energy company that

supplies fuel to the Gaza Strip in an American court -- on the grounds that the energy company is aiding and abetting Hamas. "Obviously, at every stage, fuel is a necessity. Just as we are trying to stop money [from going into] Gaza, we are trying to stop material support," Nitsana Darshan-Leitner of the Israel-based human rights organization Shurat HaDin-Israel Law Center told Cybercast News Service..

Darshan-Leitner and New York City attorney Robert Tolchin sent a letter to Dor Alon Energy on behalf of the victims of a recent Hamas rocket attacks on southern Israel. They are warning the company that it could be sued for damages if it continues to supply fuel to the Gaza Strip.

Dor Alon Energy is the exclusive supplier of fuel to the Gaza Strip. It is part of the Alon Group that operates in the U.S. through Alon U.S.A. Energy Inc., which trades on the New York Stock Exchange as ALJ. According to its Web site, Alon U.S.A. operates crude oil refineries in Texas, California and Oregon. It markets fuel products under the FINA brand name in some 1,100 locations throughout the U.S., including through more than 300 7-Eleven convenience stores, mostly in Texas and New Mexico.

Israel claims that Hamas is seizing some 50 percent of all the fuel supplied to Gaza and using it in the manufacture, transport and launch of rockets at southern Israeli communities. Some of the fuel is used to take terrorists to and from the rocket launch sites, the Shurat HaDin-Israel Law Center said.

Hamas, which is on the State Department's list of terrorist organizations, claims responsibility for launching mortars and rockets from the Gaza Strip. But Israel argues that even when other groups claim responsibility for rocket attacks, nothing happens in Gaza without Hamas' approval. Hamas seized control of the Gaza Strip from forces loyal to Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas a year ago.

On Wednesday, Hamas claimed responsibility for a mortar attack that hit a factory in the border community of Kibbutz Nir Oz, killing Amnon Rozenberg, 51, a father of three. Three other people were injured. Two employees of Dor Alon were killed in April, in a terrorist attack on the only fuel transfer point into the Gaza Strip. Israel blamed that attack on Hamas even though other groups claimed responsibility.

"Dor Alon Energy has continually chosen to place its own financial welfare above the security concerns of the residents of Sderot and the Western Negev who have to suffer daily attacks launched upon them from Gaza using the fuel supplied by the company," Darshan-Leitner said.

American law prohibits aiding, abetting and providing material support to terrorist organizations, she said. They are warning Dor Alon that by supplying fuel to Gaza -- fuel that is being seized by Hamas -- the company is actually aiding and abetting a terrorist organization. Darshan-Leitner said if the company is faced with the possibility of hundreds of millions of dollars in claims, it won't consider it profitable to business in Gaza anymore.

Darshan-Leitner has been involved in helping other American victims of Palestinian terror attacks sue the PLO in the U.S.

A representative of Dor Alon did not respond to a phone call from Cybercast News Service, and a radio report on Friday said the company did not want to comment.

Gil Karie, a spokesman for the army, said that Dor Alon is a private company that supplies fuel to the Palestinian Authority through a civilian agreement that has nothing to do with the government of Israel. The fuel comes to the Nahal Oz crossing in trucks belonging to the company and is transferred through special pumps and pipes to the Palestinian side.

Hamas is the only government in the Gaza Strip. It is responsible for supplying fuel to the population, said Karie. Israel would rather have the fuel distributed to the Palestinian people for humanitarian needs, and it is sorry to see that Hamas is putting its own agenda first, he said.

Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said on Friday that Israel is getting close to making a decision on the Gaza Strip. Before leaving Washington on Thursday, where he met with President Bush, Olmert said that Israel was "nearing a crossroads in Gaza" and was "close to launching an operation in Gaza." Olmert also said that Israel would not commit itself unconditionally to any Egyptian-mediated truce with Hamas, a deal that remains elusive at this time. Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said on Thursday that military action in Gaza "is closer than ever" and would likely precede any truce.

So far this year, more than 2,300 Kassam rockets and mortars have been launched at Israel compared with 2,540 in all of 2007. On Friday, four Kassam rockets were launched at Israel, including one that struck the parking lot of a college -- the same school where a student was killed in another recent rocket attack, the army said. On Thursday evening, the Israeli air force struck a Hamas outpost in response to a mortar attack earlier in the day that killed an Israeli. Palestinians said 10 people were wounded in the Israeli air strike.