Gaza Strip | Ceasefire violation – Israeli airstrikes against targets – VIDEO

Defence Redefined

16/06/2021

Early in the morning, the Israeli Air Force launched airstrikes in the Gaza Strip in retaliation for the use of incendiary balloons against the southern part of the Israeli territory, reported sources close to the Palestinian security forces and witnesses. The information was also confirmed later by the Israeli army.

These airstrikes and the use of incendiary balloons are the first serious incidents since May 21, when the ceasefire agreement between Israel and Palestinian organizations in the enclave came into force after the 11-day lightning-fast conflict. Two hundred and sixty people died on the Palestinian side, including children, teenagers and fighters, and another 13 lost their lives in Israel, including a child, a teenager and a soldier.

According to Palestinian sources, the Israeli Air Force struck at least one facility east of Khan Yunis, a city in the southern Gaza Strip, a pocket of two million people where about a thousand apartments, offices and shops were destroyed in this new round of Israeli war, the fourth one since 2008. A French Agency photographer said he heard several explosions. The same was reported by Reuters, citing eyewitnesses. These are the first Israeli strikes on the Palestinian enclave ruled by Hamas Islamists, where a suffocating Israeli blockade prevails after a heterogeneous alliance came to power on Sunday night, ending Benjamin Netanyahu’s 12-year monarchy.

In a statement, the Israeli staff said that it hit the facilities of the armed wing of Hamas in the Gaza Strip in retaliation for the use of incendiary balloons that caused fires in fields in southern Israel. It was stated that it is “ready for all scenarios”, including “the resumption of hostilities”, in the face of “continuing terrorist attacks on the part of Gaza”. The airstrikes took place shortly after noon in front of a crowd of 2,000 people in eastern Jerusalem, killing at least 12 people and wounding dozens more, according to local firefighters.

The United States and the United Nations have called for “restraint” ahead of this highly controversial move, which the new Israeli government of Naftali Bennett has allowed to take place, but changing its course to avoid incidents with Palestinians. Hamas has threatened retaliation if the march, aimed at celebrating the occupation and annexation of East Jerusalem, the Palestinian part of the holy city in the 1967 war, took place in Muslim neighborhoods.

Also read: “Our campaign against terrorists continues” – Another night of bombing in the Gaza Strip – VIDEO