Israel is again launching airstrikes in the Gaza Strip, the most violent in more than a year. The target: the terrorist group Islamic Jihad. 15 extremists were killed. Hamas speaks of a crime. Dozens of rockets are fired from Gaza towards Israel.
The worst escalation of violence between Israel and the Palestinians in more than a year has occurred in the Gaza Strip. Israeli forces said on Friday they had killed 15 extremists, including a leader of the Palestinian militant organization Islamic Jihad, in airstrikes in the Gaza Strip. The Palestinian health authorities initially spoke of ten dead, including a five-year-old girl, and 79 injured. As a result, Islamic Jihad fired dozens of rockets towards Israel.
Israeli Prime Minister Jair Lapid spoke on Friday evening of a "precise anti-terrorist operation against an immediate threat". Islamic Jihad is an "auxiliary force of Iran that wants to destroy the State of Israel and kill innocent Israelis". The government will "do everything to defend our people". Israel doesn't want an escalating conflict in the Gaza Strip, "but we won't shy away from it either."
An Israeli army spokesman stressed that the operation would continue: "We're not done yet." There were more airstrikes on the Gaza Strip on Saturday night. Islamic Jihad accused Israel of starting a "war against our people". The "great jihadi commander Taysir al-Jabari" was also killed in the airstrikes.
Hamas, the ruling party in the Gaza Strip, said the attacks had "committed another crime that Israel is paying for." All Palestinian organizations are called to fight: "All fronts must open fire on the enemy."
In the evening, AFP correspondents in Gaza observed rockets being fired from the Gaza Strip towards Israel. Sirens wailed in Israeli towns near the border with the Palestinian Territories. Islamic Jihad declared that "more than a hundred rockets were fired at Tel Aviv, central cities and areas around Gaza" as a "first response" to the deaths of the jihad commander and his "martyr brothers".
The Israeli army first confirmed that at least 70 rockets had been fired from the Gaza Strip. Dozens of them were intercepted by the Iron Dome air defense system, others landed in uninhabited areas. Initially, there was no information about possible injuries in Israel.
In view of the new escalation of violence, Egypt is trying to mediate between Israel and the Palestinians. "We hope to reach a consensus to return to calm as soon as possible," said an Egyptian security official in the Gaza Strip. The Israeli army spokesman Richard Hecht had previously also spoken of an Egyptian mediation without giving details.
The airstrikes came four days after two border crossings between Israel and the Gaza Strip were closed for security reasons. Earlier, two senior members of Islamic Jihad were arrested in Jenin in the West Bank.
The current escalation of violence is the most violent in the Gaza Strip since May last year. At the time, Hamas had fired rockets towards Israel, whereupon the Israeli Air Force bombed targets in the Gaza Strip. More than 260 people were killed in the Gaza Strip during the 11-day fighting, and 13 were killed in Israel.
