Israeli warplanes carried out retaliatory strikes against Gaza-based terrorists early Sunday and rocket alarms sounded near communities inside Israel as Hamas said it launched a fresh round of missiles, in the latest tit-for-tat that threatened to send the region spiraling into another round of conflict.
The Israel Defense Forces said in a short statement just after 1 a.m. Sunday that it was attacking Gaza in retaliation for a Saturday evening missile strike, which had broken a month of relative calm. It said a central rocket-making site used by Hamas was among the facilities targeted.
Hamas’s Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades armed wing said a short time later that it had launched surface-to-surface missiles and had targeted the Israeli planes with anti-aircraft fire.
A rocket alert was issued for open areas near the small farming communities of Shlomit and Bnei Betzarim, which sit near the Egyptian border and opposite Gaza’s Rafah, the IDF said.
There was no confirmation of any missile strike inside Israel.
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Gaza’s Shehab news outlet, which is linked to the Hamas terror group, reported that “the resistance” — a term which usually refers to Hamas — had fired two missiles toward Sufa, an Israeli kibbutz near the frontier with southern Gaza.
The Israeli sortie came hours after a projectile launched out of Gaza landed in an open field near the communities of Nahal Oz and Kfar Aza Saturday evening. There were no reports of injuries or damage.
The military said fighter jets targeted a weapons workshop and tunnel used by the Hamas, which de facto rules the Strip.
“The workshop is used as a main site for making most of the group’s rockets in the Strip,” the IDF said in a statement.
????العدوان الإسرائيلي المتواصل على قطاع غزة الآن????????#غزة_تحت_القصف #غزة #فلسطين #القدس #نابلس pic.twitter.com/8nti9uqrq2
— Karim Kassem (@quranka62959257) December 3, 2022
On social media, Gazans reported hearing several rounds of air strikes near Khan Younis and Rafah in the south of the Strip.
Unconfirmed video footage appeared to show several large explosions.
غارات اسرائيلية على موقع للمقاومة غرب خانيونس pic.twitter.com/7zWeVRQcp1
— وكالة شهاب للأنباء (@ShehabAgency) December 3, 2022
There was no claim of responsibility for the Saturday night rocket launch, and no official Hamas claim over the alleged early Sunday missile launches. The terror group pointedly stayed on the sidelines during the last major flare-up in August, and its direct involvement in firing rockets, if confirmed, could signal readiness for a wider confrontation.
Israeli officials reportedly expressed concerns over the weekend about potential retaliation, including in the form of rocket fire from Gaza, over the deaths of two Palestinian Islamic Jihad members.
Both PIJ and the Hamas terror group that rules the Gaza Strip threatened to hit back over the deaths of the pair, who were killed Thursday during a military raid in the West Bank.
Over the past year, the PIJ has launched rockets at Israel in response to members being killed or arrested in the West Bank.
Still, there was no immediate claim by any of the Gaza-based terror groups for the rocket fire Saturday.
In the past, Israel has responded with airstrikes against Hamas sites regardless of the group launching the attack. More rarely, it has directed its response at Islamic Jihad, if the terror group claimed responsibility.
The last time rockets were fired from the coastal enclave toward Israel was on November 3, apparently in response to the death of a PIJ member during a West Bank raid.
