Militants in Gaza fire hundreds of rockets at Israel in airstrikes

Gaza militants fired more than 400 rockets into Israel on Wednesday, reaching as far north as the sky over Tel Aviv’s suburbs, as Israel launched dozens of airstrikes on what it described as rocket launch sites and military compounds operated by the Islamic State. Jihad militant group in the Palestinian coastal enclave.

The flare-up came after an attack by Israel on Islamic Jihad on Tuesday killed three of the group’s top commanders, along with 10 civilians, including four children, Palestinian officials said. The killings left both Israelis and Palestinians bracing for an escalation in cross-border attacks at a time when violence was rising in the region.

Less than 48 hours after Israel’s opening strike sparked its third confrontation with Islamic Jihad in 10 months, intense ceasefire mediation efforts were underway.

Hamas, the larger militant group that controls Gaza, said Wednesday afternoon that its political chief, Ismail Haniya, had received calls from Egyptian, Qatari and UN officials. Hours later, Islamic Jihad — which is fully supported by Iran and classified as a terrorist organization by Israel, the United States and many other Western countries — held out terms Israel was unlikely to accept, including a halt to targeted killings.

Mohammad Al Hindi, a senior Islamic Jihad official, said in a statement that Israel’s failure to comply with that demand stood in the way of a ceasefire agreement, but added: “Efforts are still ongoing. Through.”

But at about 2 a.m. Thursday, around the same hour as the targeted killings on Tuesday, local Palestinians reported that Israel had killed another Islamic Jihad military leader in a precise strike that destroyed an apartment on the top floor of a building in the city. destroyed. Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip. According to initial reports, the militant’s brother was also killed in the attack. In a statement, the Israeli military said it had killed an Islamic Jihad commander and two other militants.

On Tuesday night, Israel hit a car in Khan Yunis that it said was carrying members of an Islamic Jihad unit on its way to a launch pad carrying an anti-tank guided missile, killing two.

After Israel’s initial attack on Tuesday, at least eight more Palestinians were killed in subsequent Israeli attacks on Tuesday and Wednesday, according to the Gaza health ministry. The military wing of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a small armed faction involved in the rocket fire, claimed four of the dead as members. The Israeli army identified two others as agents of the Islamic Jihad anti-tank missile team. Gaza’s health ministry said at least 64 Palestinians were injured in total.

There were no immediate reports of casualties on the Israeli side.

The Israeli army said Wednesday’s attacks were mainly defensive, aimed at thwarting imminent Islamic Jihad attacks. Later, as rocket fire from Gaza continued, Israel expanded its targets in Gaza with what it described as compounds used to make and store weapons, and one used by Islamic Jihad naval forces. It also hit several homes after warning residents to leave, according to local Palestinian news reports.

The army said it hit more than 40 rocket and mortar launch sites in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday afternoon.

Most rocket attacks targeted areas of southern Israel close to the border with Gaza, and many of those heading for Israeli population centers were intercepted by Israel’s air defenses. An empty house in the border town of Sderot was directly hit and several other houses in southern Israel were damaged by rockets that fell nearby.

The Israeli military said a missile was intercepted over the Tel Aviv area by the David’s Sling air defense system, designed to handle missiles and missiles with a longer range than the older Iron Dome system. It was Israel’s first successful use of David’s Sling in battlefield conditions and in a conflict with Gaza, the army said.

Officials and analysts said whether Hamas would join Islamic Jihad in retaliatory attacks against Israel would determine the length and intensity of the current round of fighting.

Israeli army chief spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said the rockets fired on Wednesday were launched exclusively by Islamic Jihad and there was no indication that Hamas was directly involved.

While it has kept out of the fighting, Hamas expressed solidarity with Islamic Jihad and claimed that its retaliation against Israel was a joint operation. “The operation confirmed the readiness of the resistance to respond to the occupation’s crimes,” Hazem Qassem, a Hamas spokesman, said in a statement.

Hamas’ interests differ from those of Islamic Jihad, as Hamas is responsible for the population of more than two million Palestinians in Gaza, a largely impoverished area operating under a strict air, land and naval blockade imposed by Israel and Egypt. Hamas has been less eager to fight Israel over the past year as Israel issued nearly 20,000 permits for Gaza residents to work in Israel, where they can earn significantly more than in the coastal enclave.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, Israel kept its border crossings with Gaza closed, preventing the passage of people or goods.

Israel seemed to be sending mixed messages about its intentions.

Admiral Hagari said the army was not seeking further escalation, but stabilization of the area.

“Israel is not interested in war,” he said. He added that Israel had achieved its goal in the first minutes of the campaign with the assassination of the three Islamic Jihad commanders.

But in a call on Wednesday with regional council heads in southern Israel, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said: “We are ready for the possibility of an extended campaign and hard attacks on Gaza,” according to a statement from his office.

And in a televised speech Wednesday night, Mr. Netanyahu to summarize the campaign. “We dealt Islamic Jihad in Gaza the heaviest blow in its history,” he said, adding that Israel had created a “new equation” by taking the initiative. “We will choose the time and place to attack you,” he said.

Israel’s operation against Islamic Jihad on Tuesday had taken some time, officials said, as the military waited for the required intelligence and weather conditions. They said the decision to assassinate leaders of the group in Gaza was made on May 2, the day Islamic Jihad fired more than a hundred rockets and mortar shells into southern Israel after the death in Israeli custody of a Palestinian hunger striker, Khader Adnan . who protested against his arrest. Mr. Adnan was an Islamic Jihad leader from the occupied West Bank.

Amid fears of a wave of fighting, Palestinian schools in Gaza remained closed on Wednesday, as did Israeli schools within easy reach of the territory. People were stocking up on food. Thousands of Israeli residents along the border left their homes on Tuesday in anticipation of Islamic Jihad or other militant groups to take revenge on the Israeli airstrikes.

With rocket fire reaching deep into Israel on Wednesday, Israel’s Defense Minister Yoav Gallant sought government approval to extend the state of emergency he declared Tuesday to Israeli towns and communities up to 50 miles from the Gaza border. The statement severely restricts gatherings and instructs residents to stay close to safe rooms and bomb shelters.

Iyad Abuheweila contributed reporting from Gaza City, Hiba Yazbek from Jerusalem and Gabby Sobelman from Rehovot, Israel.