From what I’ve heard in reporting, they build rockets from parts of unexploded Israeli bombs. Over the last 4 months, I have no doubt they’ve found a few duds and accumulated the material with which to hack these things together.
What is clear now is that the very weapons that Israeli forces have used to enforce a blockade of Gaza over the past 17 years are now being used against them. Israeli and American military explosives have enabled Hamas to shower Israel with rockets and, for the first time, penetrate Israeli towns from Gaza.
“Unexploded ordnance is a main source of explosives for Hamas,” said Michael Cardash, the former deputy head of the Israeli National Police Bomb Disposal Division and an Israeli police consultant. “They are cutting open bombs from Israel, artillery bombs from Israel, and a lot of them are being used, of course, and repurposed for their explosives and rockets.”
The Iranian narrative is that they kick-started all the missile production in Gaza and gave them the technical and knowledge base, but now the Palestinians are self-sufficient, said Fabian Hinz, an independent security analyst focusing on missiles in the Mideast.
The article suggests that the IDF suppressed Hamas’ capabilities, but if you look at the timeline Hamas rocket firings basically ceased when SA filed with the ICJ (except for new years, for obvious reasons). Following the ICJ ruling (and Israel’s blatant disregard of it), Hamas has decided to continue firing rockets.
It’s further away, so more effort to build rockets and harder to hit. Hamas never stopped firing rockets on Israel. On the 7 October 2023 terror attack alone, reports range from 3000 to 5000 projectiles or rockets within 24 hours and in the following conflict, they kept firing missiles on Israel.
The point is that Hamas doesn’t stop firing rockets. I’m not there, so I don’t know if they fire on southern Israel every single day, but twice a week everyone can read about rockets fired at Israel and sirens going off. It seems just Tel Aviv wasn’t targeted for a few weeks (this article). In the link below Ashkelon is mentioned as well with a short break of 2 weeks. But as I said before, the further north, the longer the range they need to build and with the claims they are running short on weapon supplies, this makes sense that further targets get hit less often.
e.g. just a few days ago:
“Hamas welcomes UN court ruling as it fires rockets on Israel (January 26, 2024; The Telepgraph)”
“Hamas appears to have targeted the south of Israel, where attacks have become increasingly rare amid claims the group is running out of missiles. Rockets were sighted over the city of Ashkelon for the first time in two weeks.”