The attack on Eilat in August killed eight Israelis.
Interior Ministry spokesman Ihab Ghussein was responding to speculation on Israeli websites that said Israel had determined it was 12 Bedouins who carried out the operation.
His ministry had reiterated repeatedly that there was no evidence to support the allegation that anyone in Gaza was responsible, despite the Israeli army's initial claims it was the Popular Resistance Committees.
He also denied reports in Israeli media of al-Qaeda operatives entering Gaza.
“The Israeli occupation always holds the Gaza Strip responsible for any attack, and uses that as a pretext to launch strikes against civilians,” Ghussein said.
But remarks by a top Israeli official Tuesday suggest that policy may be changing.
Strategic Affairs Ministry director Yosef Kuperwasser speculated that the Strip's governing Hamas are incapable of curbing smaller Palestinian militant groups in the territory.
Referring to Hamas' seizure of Gaza in 2007 from forces loyal to President Mahmoud Abbas, Kuperwasser told an Israeli security conference the group "is not capable of implementing this responsibility".
"It is not in control of what happens in Gaza. Islamic Jihad does what it wants, the Popular Resistance Committees does what it wants, and the Fatah military wing does everything it wants," he said, citing sometime Hamas allies who have also chafed at its authority.
Kuperwasser, a former chief analyst for Israel's military intelligence, said such disarray supported Israel's policy of barrier-building along the Palestinian territories, "as this signals that the frontier ends here".
Maan News Agency
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