‘Israeli’ Warplanes Attack Gaza Strip, Prompt Retaliatory Attacks

By Staff, Agencies

The Zionist occupation regime has carried out new airstrikes against several areas across the Gaza Strip, triggering retaliatory rocket fire from Palestinian resistance groups based in the besieged enclave.

The ‘Israeli’ warplanes pounded targets in the center of Gaza City on Thursday, Palestinian media outlets reported, adding that the resistance groups’ anti-aircraft defense systems intercepted the regime’s fighter jets.

The ‘Israeli’ military claimed in a statement that it struck a weapons manufacturing site belonging to the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas in the central Gaza Strip after confirming that it is “striking in” the coastal enclave.

It further claimed the strikes came in response to a rocket launch from the Gaza Strip into ‘Israeli’ communities a day earlier.

Local sources and witnesses said that the first ‘Israeli’ strike – out of at least seven – hit a training center belonging to the Ezzedine al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas.

A second round of ‘Israeli’ airstrikes targeted the resistance’s training center southwest of Gaza City, they added.

In response, the resistance groups fired a barrage of retaliatory rockets at illegal ‘Israeli’ settlements surrounding the besieged Gaza Strip. Rocket sirens blared in the town of Sderot following the strikes, according to the ‘Israeli’ military. 

The latest development comes almost a week after the Zionist military pounded areas west and south of Gaza, including posts belonging to the Palestinian resistance.

The strikes were carried out after at least 10 Palestinians were martyred at the hands of ‘Israeli’ occupation forces in the occupied West Bank city of Jenin, including a 61-year-old woman.

Last Thursday, more than 70 ‘Israeli’ armed vehicles and hundreds of the regime’s soldiers stormed Jenin and the neighboring refugee camp, while ‘Israeli’ snipers were deployed on rooftops and heavily armed soldiers opened fire at Palestinian youths who tried to block their way. Ten Palestinians were killed in the attack.

Hamas and the Palestinian Islamic Jihad resistance movement vowed to respond to the raid.

According to reports, more than 30 Palestinians have been killed since the beginning of 2023.