The situation is a little more tense in the Near East. The Israeli army carried out airstrikes on southern Lebanon and the Gaza Strip on Thursday evening, in retaliation for the firing of around 30 rockets from Lebanon earlier Thursday, for which the Jewish state attributes responsibility to Palestinian groups.
Israel attacked Gaza and Lebanon before dawn on Friday, saying it was targeting Hamas targets, after dozens of rockets were fired at Israel the day before from these two territories. Strikes were underway around 4:30 a.m. Israel time in both southern Lebanon and Gaza, according to a military statement.
This is the latest episode in a sudden rise in tension in the Middle East since Wednesday, after a relative lull in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict observed since the start of Ramadan on March 23.
Explosions in the Tire region
Violent explosions were heard in the Tire region of southern Lebanon. A resident of the Rachidiye Palestinian refugee camp, near Tyre, Abu Ahmad, told AFP that “at least two shells fell near the camp”. An AFP correspondent in this region said that a shell had fallen on the roof of a house in a plantation near the camp, causing material damage. In Gaza, the Israeli air raids had begun before midnight.
On Thursday, the day of Passover, around 30 rockets were fired from Lebanon into Israel, injuring one person and causing material damage, in an escalation on the Israeli-Lebanese front unparalleled since 2006.
These shots took place the day after the violent irruption of the Israeli police in the Al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem, the third holiest site in Islam, in order to dislodge Palestinians who had barricaded themselves there.
‘Israel’s enemies’ will pay ‘a heavy price’
The Israeli army said it was certain that the unclaimed rocket attacks from Lebanon were “Palestinian”, and according to it probably the work of Hamas or Islamic Jihad. “Our response […] will make Israel’s enemies pay a heavy price,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said after a security cabinet meeting. “Israeli defense is ready to face any threat, on any front,” said Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant.
Lebanon and Israel “do not want war”, said Friday the United Nations Interim Force (UNIFIL) deployed in southern Lebanon to buffer between the two countries, after contacts between the two parties. Peacekeepers have called on “all parties to cease all actions” on both sides of the border, following Israeli strikes at dawn on Friday that followed the firing of rockets into Israel from Lebanese territory.