Finding Palestinians (particularly the Jordanian variety) among al-Qaeda is nothing new, but over the last two days it seems that the network's infrastructure in Gaza has finally organized into a distinct group according to media reports. Called Jundallah, the majority of its members consist of former Hamas and Islamic Jihad members who decided that the other groups were "too moderate" for their liking.

Jundallah, not surprisingly, denies any connections to al-Qaeda but does adopt a far more strident line with respect to carrying out attacks on US targets (Hamas usually tries to skirt this issue with a "Maybe we will, maybe we won't" kind of approach) and refuses to accept any kind of truce or cease-fire with Israel.

To be fair, accusations about al-Qaeda activity in the Gaza Strip are nothing new - Sharon mentioned them in 2002 following the failed attack on the El Al airliner in Mombasa, Kenya, but the general consensus at the time had been that whatever infrastructure the network had in the area was pretty spread out, in large part because most Palestinian Islamists who would normally be attracted al-Qaeda tend to join Hamas, Islamic Jihad, and the al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades instead for a variety of reasons. Now that all of the major terrorist groups seem more interested in establishing and securing their own power base post-Arafat rather than attacking Israelis, al-Qaeda appears to have been able to exploit the situation by recruiting any disaffected members who happen to cross their path.

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