Alarm sirens sounded in the Jerusalem area today, according to the Israeli military, while AFP journalists heard explosions in the distance.
The escalation of violence in Gaza Strip, where since Friday they have their lives 31 Palestinians, among which six childrencontinues unabated in this conflict between the organization Islamic Jihad and Israelin the most serious crisis since May 2021.
Islamic Jihad said it launched rockets to Jerusalem for the first time since hostilities began on Friday. As many as 97% of rockets fired from Gaza were intercepted by Israel’s anti-missile defenses, according to the Israeli military.
The Jewish state, which emphasizes that it launched a “preemptive strike” aimed at Islamic Jihadclaims to have killed militants and “neutralized” the leaders of the group, which is considered a terrorist organization by Israel, the United States and the European Union.
The main military leaders of the movement in Gaza, Taishir al-Jabari and Khalid Mansour, were killed, according to the army, which was confirmed by Islamic Jihad.
According to the Ministry of Health in Gaza, 31 people, including six children, lost their lives and 265 were injured for two days in the Palestinian enclave under Israeli blockade.
Israeli authorities dispute this assessment and assert that Palestinian children were killed on Saturday by a failed Islamic Jihad rocket attack on Israel.
Alarm sirens rang out in the Jerusalem area today, according to the Israeli military, while AFP journalists heard explosions in the distance.
The rocket launches They came as hundreds of Israelis gather in the Old City for a Jewish holiday, sparking fears of violence as nationalists march on Temple Square, also known as the Temple Mount.
A an AFP photographer was arrested briefly by Israeli forces while covering a far-right MP’s visit to Temple Square.
Hamas, an Islamist movement that has ruled Gaza since 2007, warned in a statement against these Israeli “raids” that could lead to a “out of control” situation.
“The resistance” is “united in battle“against Israel, assured the Fauzi Barhum, a representative of Hamas, an organization that has waged many wars against the Jewish state, but has so far not taken part in this armed conflict.
The escalation of violence in recent days between the Jewish state and armed groups in Gaza is the worst since the May 2021 war which left behind 260 dead in eleven days on the Palestinian side, including militants, and 14 dead in Israel, including one soldier.
“Every day we wake up to dead women and childrensaid Abu Mahmoud al-Madhoun, 56, in Gaza City. “Every time an apartment or house is destroyed, people are killed, injured or displaced».
The Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid stated that the operation in Gaza would continue for “as long as it takes”calling the bombing that killed Khalid Mansour an “extraordinary result.”
That shelling in Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip killed eight people, according to the Gaza interior ministry.
In Israel, two people were slightly injured by rockets, according to rescuers.
Power outages
The arrest of a leader of the group in the West Bank last Monday led to this new cycle of violence. Israeli authorities, saying they fear reprisals, carried out the first strikes on Friday in Gaza, where Islamic Jihad is entrenched.
About 40 members of the group were also arrested in the past two days in the West Bank, Palestinian territory held by the Jewish state since 1967.
Egypt, a historic mediator between Israel and the armed groups in Gaza, is trying to intervene to de-escalate the situation. Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said on Saturday he was working “tirelessly” to restore calm, but on the ground, gunfire continued and residents remained holed up in their homes, according to AFP reporters in Gaza.
The only power station in the enclave of 2.3 million people has shut down due to fuel shortages as the Jewish state closed border crossings with Gaza in recent days, effectively cutting off diesel deliveries.
Power outages, common in the enclave, have multiplied since then, an AFP reporter noted.
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