A senior army official warned Thursday morning that Israel was nearing a full-blown military confrontation in the Gaza Strip after hundreds of rockets were launched overnight by Palestinian terror groups, adding that the government could begin evacuating communities near the coastal enclave in preparation.
“We are rapidly nearing a confrontation,” the IDF senior officer said, speaking on condition of anonymity. “Hamas is making serious mistakes, and we may have to make it clear after four years that this path doesn’t yield any results for it and isn’t worth it.”
Authorities said over 150 rockets and mortar shells were launched at Israeli communities since Wednesday evening. The barrages by the Hamas terror group continued throughout the night and into Thursday.
According to IDF spokesperson Lt. Col. Jonathan Conricus, at least seven people in total were injured in southern Israel by the Gaza rocket attacks, including a woman who was seriously injured when a projectile struck her home in the Eshkol region of southern Israel.
In response to the attacks, the Israeli army said, it struck over 140 Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip overnight.
The military said its raids targeted training compounds as well as weapons-manufacturing facilities and storage warehouses. The air force also targeted sites from which rockets were being launched, including a car that the army said was being used by a cell of terrorists. One Hamas operative was reportedly killed in the airstrike. Unconfirmed reports claimed he was the relative of a senior Hamas commander.
Hamas said a 23-year-old pregnant woman and her infant daughter were killed in an IDF strike. The woman’s husband was reported moderately injured.
Conricus said he could not comment on the case, but stressed that the air force was bombing “only military targets” in the Gaza Strip.
At least six other Palestinians were injured as a result of the IDF strikes, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.
“We have more capabilities in our arsenal,” the anonymous senior officer threatened. “We are ready to continue attacking, attacking and attacking. Our strikes deeply affect Hamas. It would be better off returning to the understandings reached after Operation Protective Edge [in 2014].”
Indeed, several hit homes and factories in Israeli communities, causing damage. One barrage that slammed into the city of Sderot Wednesday evening injured at least three Israelis. Thirteen others were treated for panic attacks, including two pregnant women who went into premature labor.
The current round of violence “is definitely not over,” Conricus said.
“We are in the midst of a new round, the end of which I cannot see yet,” the anonymous official added. “We struck a range of targets, including tunnel shafts and many military compounds belonging to Hamas. What we wanted to destroy was done very well.
“Meanwhile, there are talks on calming the situation down and reaching an agreement. This morning, I understand, Hamas is distancing itself from an agreement, and nearing a conflict in which it will suffer a hard blow. Its two million hostages will be the ones suffering.”
Following the attacks from Gaza, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman met overnight with senior officers from the IDF and other security services at the military’s headquarters in Tel Aviv, to discuss the situation and decide on a course of action.
The security cabinet was also due to hold a special session on Thursday afternoon regarding the ongoing violence.
Sirens sounded in Israeli communities throughout the night, and thousands of families slept in bomb shelters and protected spaces.
The Times of Israel is liveblogging Thursday’s events as they happen.
Czech president’s spokesperson tweets ‘solidarity’ with Israel
The president of the Czech Republic, Milos Zeman, expresses support for Israel as rockets pound the country’s south.
His spokesperson, Jiří Ovčáček, tweets an Israeli flag, together with the word “Solidarity.”
Solidarita. pic.twitter.com/wqCEIN8kr3— Jiří Ovčáček (@PREZIDENTmluvci) August 9, 2018
— Raphael Ahren
Abbas, Qatari emir meet to discuss Palestinian reconciliation
Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas informs Qatari Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani of “the latest developments related to Palestinian national reconciliation,” the official PA news site Wafa reports.
Abbas is meeting the Qatari emir on Thursday in Doha a day after holding talks with Jordanian King Abdullah II in Amman.
For the past several months, Palestinian reconciliation efforts have been at a standstill.
Rocket sirens sound in Kibbutz Kissufim
Another round of incoming rocket sirens are heard in the southern Israeli community of Kibbutz Kissufim, some two kilometers from the border with central Gaza.
There are no immediate reports of injuries or damage.
— Judah Ari Gross
Woman wounded in rocket attack regains consciousness, hospital says
The Soroka Medical Center in Beersheba says the woman seriously wounded in a rocket attack early this morning has seen her condition improve dramatically. She is no longer on a respirator and has regained consciousness, doctors say. She is now categorized in moderate condition at Soroka’s intensive care unit.
A second person wounded in that strike was treated at the hospital and has already been sent home, the hospital says.
The woman, a 30-year-old foreign worker from Thailand, suffered injuries to her abdomen and limbs when a rocket hit her home in the Eshkol regional council.
According to the IDF, at least five other people were wounded by the rocket and mortar attacks on Wednesday and today, either from shrapnel or in injuries sustained while rushing to bomb shelters. Dozens of Israelis were treated for panic attacks caused by the explosions of the rockets, including two pregnant women in the southern town of Sderot who went into premature labor.
IDF bombs Hamas attack tunnels on Gaza coast
Israeli fighter jets bomb two Hamas attack tunnels along the central Gaza coast, as well as a tunnel opening in the northern Strip and a military facility east of the southern city of Rafah, in retaliation for the more than 180 rockets and mortar shells fired at southern Israel throughout the morning, the army says.
These latest targets join the approximately 150 others that have been hit in response to repeated attacks by the Gaza-ruling Hamas and other terrorist groups in the Palestinian enclave.
“The wide-reaching attacks that the IDF has conducted caused damage and destruction to some 150 military and strategic targets belonging to the Hamas terror organization, representing a significant blow to Hamas,” the army says in a statement.
The military warns the terror group that it will “bear the consequences for its terrorist activities against the citizens of Israel.”
IDF: 180 rockets and shells fires from Gaza, 150 targets hit by IDF in Strip
The Israeli military says over 180 rockets and mortar shells have been fired at southern Israel from the Gaza Strip since Wednesday night, injuring at least seven people, including one woman seriously, and causing dozens more to suffer panic attacks.
The Iron Dome missile defense system has intercepted 30 incoming projectiles headed for population centers. Most of the remaining rockets landed in open fields, the army says.
In response to the attacks, which have damaged Israeli homes, businesses and infrastructure, the Israeli military says it has bombed approximately 150 targets in the Gaza Strip.
Twelve hours before rocket sirens began sounding in southern Israel on Wednesday evening, Hamas was expressing optimism about an agreement with Israel. Goods would flow through the Kerem Shalom crossings, there would be a five year ceasefire and Hamas would return bodies and captives as well as stop the kite intifada of burning Israel’s fields. The UN and Egypt were also optimistic that the ceasefire would happen. It was not to be; 150 rockets were fired over night.
In retrospect, the signs were already there. Hamas had evacuated several of its observation structures along the border, leading to concerns. This came in the wake of sniper fire over the last month targeting Israeli troops. The larger picture is that Israel and Hamas have been at a low-level war since March 30th, when Hamas launched the Great Return March.
In retrospect, the signs were already there. Hamas had evacuated several of its observation structures along the border, leading to concerns. This came in the wake of sniper fire over the last month targeting Israeli troops. The larger picture is that Israel and Hamas have been at a low-level war since March 30th, when Hamas launched the Great Return March.
Let’s go back and take a look at how the tensions have developed and how we got to August 8th. It is important to understand not only the military march toward greater escalation, but also the regional political context.
On March 13, Palestinian Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah and PA Intelligence chief Majed Faraj visited Gaza to open a sewage purification plant. On the way back, they were targeted by a bombing that the PA blamed on Hamas. A week later, on March 25, Hamas began firing rockets and ratcheting up tensions with Israel. It appeared that, having not achieved any kind of reconciliation with the PA, Hamas sought a new round of violence to make itself seem relevant. This came as the US had announced and was planning the move of its embassy to Jerusalem in May. The Hamas was response was the Great Return March on March 30 that coincided with Land Day and was supposed to last until what Palestinians call Nakba Day, the mourning for the loss of the 1948 war with Israel.
Hamas sustained the massive marches in Gaza against Israel’s security fence for two months. For eight Fridays, tens of thousands attempted to breach the fence into Israel. Jerusalem ordered sniper fire against the violent demonstrators and other means to stop the protests, which resulted in more than 10,000 wounded and more than 100 killed on the Palestinian side. The worst day came on May 14 as the US was opening its embassy; 58 were killed in Gaza and 2,700 wounded.
Hamas sustained the massive marches in Gaza against Israel’s security fence for two months. For eight Fridays, tens of thousands attempted to breach the fence into Israel. Jerusalem ordered sniper fire against the violent demonstrators and other means to stop the protests, which resulted in more than 10,000 wounded and more than 100 killed on the Palestinian side. The worst day came on May 14 as the US was opening its embassy; 58 were killed in Gaza and 2,700 wounded.
When Hamas found the fence riots were not working, and had not even gained it much sympathy in the international community or region, it resorted to a tactic it had discovered by chance. During the riots and protests some Palestinians flew kites over the border and some Israeli fields caught fire. By July 9th, a systematic campaign of flying burning kites into Israel had destroyed 28,000 dunams of fields and national parks near Gaza.
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