Rocket warning sirens blared on the Gaza Strip border on Saturday night amid escalating violence between Israel and the Palestinians in the coastal Strip, as one rocket hit a house in the community of Sha’ar Hanegev.
There were no immediate reports of casualties and the army could only confirm that a rocket had been fired into Israel.
The rocket caused significant damage and several residents of the community were treated for anxiety, the Ynet news site.
Video footage of the land site showed damage to the roof of the building.
The sirens sounded in the communities of Sufa and Holit near southern Gaza. Several minutes later warnings went near the Erez crossing and Sha’ar Hanegev in the north. The IDF said it was investigating.
Four IDF soldiers were wounded when an explosive device was detonated on an IDF patrol along the Gaza Strip border on Saturday. Two of the soldiers were in a serious condition and two were moderately hurt, the army said.
An Israeli tank fired a shell at an observation post in response to the attack, the army said.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is in Germany, called the incident “serious” and vowed Israel will respond.
“The incident on the Gaza border is very serious. We will respond appropriately,” Netanayhu said, sending his wishes for a rapid recovery to the injured soldiers.
President Reuven Rivlin said Israel would not be cowed by terror.
“We will not be quiet in the face of any type of terror against our soldiers who are protecting the lives of the citizens of Israel,” he said.
The incident occurred in the southern Gaza area near the city of Khan Younis, the IDF said. Information regarding the condition of the soldiers had been censored until their families were notified.
The soldiers were evacuated by helicopter to Soroka hospital in Beersheeba for treatment, where three of them were rushed into surgery. Doctors said described their conditions were stable and not life threatening.
An IDF spokesperson called the attack “a serious incident that aimed at destabilizing the region.”
The spokesperson told reporters that the patrol stopped along the border to remove a flag that had been placed at the fence a day earlier during a protest, and that a device planted below the flag then detonated.
The spokesperson said that the patrol — made up of Golani infantry soldiers and members of a combat engineering unit — was operating with standard procedures to remove any foreign object from the border fence, but that these would now be reviewed.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Saturday vowed Israel would respond after four IDF soldiers were wounded by a bomb planted along the Gaza Strip border fence.
An Israeli tank fired a shell at an observation post in an initial response to the attack, but Netanyahu said there would be further reaction from Israel.
Soon after Netanyahu spoke, further Israeli retaliation was reported, with Palestinians saying the IDF carried out a series of strikes on targets on Hamas bases, both in northern and southern Gaza.
Also during the strikes an IDF tank opened fire on a group of Palestinians approaching the border in a “suspicious manner,” the army said. The Hamas-run health ministry said at least two people were wounded.
The army later confirmed it hit six targets, including an attack tunnel that Hamas was building in near Zeitoun in southern Gaza.
Among the other targets were “specific military targets belonging to the Hamas terror organization in the Gaza Strip and a Hamas base for producing weapons,” the army said,” adding that it holds Hamas responsible for all violence emanating from the Strip.
Immediately after the air strikes, rocket warning sirens blared in Israeli communities near the Gaza border. Hamas claimed it fired anti-aircraft missiles at the IAF planes, setting off the warning sirens in southern Gaza.
“This came in the frame of confronting the ongoing Zionist aggression against our people in the Gaza Strip,” Hamas’s military wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades claimed without elaborating.
The incident comes amid mounting warnings that tensions in Gaza could lead to a new conflict between Israel and Gaza’s Hamas rulers. Israel holds Hamas responsible for any violence emanating from the Strip.
Last week IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot warned ministers during a cabinet meeting that Israel could soon face another war with Gaza-based terror group Hamas, as a result of the deteriorating humanitarian and economic conditions in the coastal enclave.
Following a wide-scale attack on Hamas terrorist targets in Gaza on Saturday night, Israeli military forces were once again called upon to defend the southern border late Saturday night.
An IDF tank fired a shell a short time ago at four Gaza terrorists who approached the border security fence near Rafah, in southern Gaza.
Arab media sources report that two of the terrorists are dead, and two are injured, following the incident, according to Israel’s Channel 20.
The rocket alert siren was sounded multiple times in the Eshkol region in communities along the Gaza border at around 2:30 AM, and then again at 2:45 AM on Sunday.
2:50 AM Arab sources say that Israel has begun retaliating against Gaza. In live feeds from Gaza, one can hear explosions in the background.
2:52 AM Sderot region: Rocket Alarm
2:54 Sderot: Rocket Alert…
2:54: Ashkelon, Ashkelon Beach: Rocekt Alerts…
2:59 AM: No information yet on any rocket hits.
Israeli military forces attacked Hamas targets in Gaza Saturday night in response to a terrorist roadside bombing along the Gaza border security barrier earlier in the day that wounded four IDF soldiers.
“Today’s incident on the Gaza Strip border is severe,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement issued from Germany, where he was attending the Munich Security Conference. “We will respond appropriately. I send my wishes for a quick recovery to the wounded.”
A roadside bomb detonated Saturday afternoon against an IDF military force moving near the border fence of the southern Gaza Strip. Two IDF soldiers were seriously injured and two others sustained moderate and minor wounds. The soldiers were evacuated to the hospital for medical treatment, with the two seriously wounded soldiers immediately taken in to surgery.
Shortly after, the IDF attacked a Palestinian Islamic Jihad post near the security fence on the Gaza side of the border, near the point where the bomb had been detonated.
A much more comprehensive retaliation followed on Saturday night. The Israel Defense Forces retaliated against Hamas with a large-scale attack on Gaza terrorist targets within the hour following the release of the prime minister’s statement.
A total of six terrorist targets were attacked, according to the IDF spokesperson:
– an offensive terror tunnel built by Hamas from the Zeitoun neighborhood, towards Israel;
– a Hamas military compound on the site of the former Jewish community of Netzarim in Gush Katif, including weapons factory sites;
– a Hamas military compound in Khan Younis.
“The IDF views with great severity the attempt by the Hamas terrorist organization to carry out spontaneous and seemingly spontaneous demonstrations intended to turn the security fence into a confrontation zone, and to carry out acts of terror that would destabilize the Gaza Strip,” the IDF Spokesperson said.
“Hamas is responsible that event and its consequences, as well as for everything happening in and out of the Gaza Strip, above and below ground.
“The IDF is determined to provide security to the citizens of Israel and will do so by all means at its disposal.”
Palestinian groups in Gaza on Saturday hailed as “heroic” the bombing of an IDF patrol along the border fence that wounded four soldiers, and said they would not remain idle in the face of Israeli “aggression.”
The Hamas terror group that rules Gaza said would react “in the face of Israeli encroachment on the land and holy sites,” but did not claim the attack.
The incident occurred in the southern Gaza area near the city of Khan Younis, the IDF said. The soldiers were evacuated by helicopter to Soroka hospital in Beersheba for treatment, where three of them were rushed into surgery. None of them was in life-threatening condition, the hospital said later Saturday.
Immediately after the attack, an IDF tank fired a tank shell at an observation post. Palestinian media said it belonged to the Palestinian Islamic Jihad. There has been no statement from the group. Later, Israel carried out further retaliatory strikes, including at Hamas targets.
Islamic Jihad has been vowing to avenge an incident where Israel destroyed one of the terrorist group’s attack tunnels that crossed from Gaza into Israel, killing many of the groups members.
Amid escalating violence between Israel and the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, Hamas’s military wing, Izz ad Din al Qassam, claimed on Saturday night that it had used anti-aircraft missiles against Israeli jets flying over the coastal territory.
A brief statement issued by the terror group said that its aircraft targeted Israeli jets as they were launching airstrikes on the Gaza Strip.
“This came in the frame of confronting the ongoing Zionist aggression against our people in the Gaza Strip,” the group claimed without elaborating.
The IDF declined to comment on the claim, citing its policy not to respond to “external reports.”
Meanwhile, Ashraf al Kidreh, spokesman for the Palestinian Ministry of Health, said that two Palestinians were moderately injured as a result of Israeli artillery shelling east of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip.
And a rocket fired from the Strip landed in Israel, hitting a house in the community of Sha’ar Hanegev and causing significant damage but no casualties.
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