Gaza boils as Hamas, Israel clash
GAZA/JERUSALEM: A confrontation between Israel and Hamas sparked by weeks of tensions in contested Jerusalem escalated on Tuesday. Israel unleashed new airstrikes on Gaza, killing a number of militants and civilians, while militants barraged southern Israel with hundreds of rockets, killing two Israelis.
On Tuesday night, the Israeli city of Tel Aviv was under fire from a barrage of rockets launched from the Gaza Strip.
The outgoing volleys set off air raid sirens across the city, and Israel’s anti-rocket defence systems were activated.
GAZA/JERUSALEM: A confrontation between Israel and Hamas sparked by weeks of tensions in contested Jerusalem escalated on Tuesday. Israel unleashed new airstrikes on Gaza, killing a number of militants and civilians, while militants barraged southern Israel with hundreds of rockets, killing two Israelis.
On Tuesday night, the Israeli city of Tel Aviv was under fire from a barrage of rockets launched from the Gaza Strip.
The outgoing volleys set off air raid sirens across the city, and Israel’s anti-rocket defence systems were activated.
Hamas said it launched a total of 130 rockets, its most intense strike so far, in response to Israel’s destruction of a high-rise building in Gaza earlier in the evening. Since sundown on Monday, 28 Palestinians including 10 children and a woman - were killed in Gaza, most by airstrikes, health officials there said. The Israeli military said at least 16 of the dead were militants.
Two women were killed by rockets fired from Gaza that hit their homes in the southern city of Ashkelon - the first Israeli deaths in the current violence. At least 10 other Israelis have
Netanyahu vows to step up attacks on Hamas
After those deaths, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said officials decided to “increase both the strength and rate of the strikes” against militant groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad in the Gaza Strip. “Hamas will receive blows now that it didn’t expect,” he said.
Egypt was trying to broker a ceasefire, but the cycle of violence was gaining momentum. Even before the two Israeli deaths, the Israeli military said it was sending troop reinforcements to the Gaza border and the defence minister ordered the mobilisation of 5,000 reserve soldiers. The barrage of rockets and airstrikes was preceded by hours of clashes on Monday between Palestinians and Israeli security forces, including dramatic confrontations at Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa mosque compound.
The current violence has been fuelled by conflicting claims over Jerusalem, which is at the emotional core of the long conflict. In a sign of widening unrest, hundreds of residents of Arab communities in Israel staged overnight demonstrations denouncing the recent actions of Israeli security forces against Palestinians.