New violence in the Middle East: Rockets fired at Israel

Palestinian militants have fired rockets at Israel. The Israeli military struck back. Against the background of the latest wave of terror, there are growing concerns about a new escalation.

Militant Palestinians in the Gaza Strip fired rockets at the Israeli border area again during the night. The sirens sounded twice in the southern part of the country, as the Israeli army announced on Twitter. After a rocket hit the border town of Sderot in the evening, a second rocket fired during the night landed in the Gaza Strip itself. Initially, there was talk of a total of four rockets fired during the night. An Israeli army spokeswoman corrected this information in the morning. In this case, the alarm was triggered by “fire from the Gaza Strip, but not rockets”.

In response to the first attack, the Israeli army said it fired on an underground complex in the Gaza Strip used to build rocket engines. This will limit the Palestinians’ ability to manufacture rockets. “We hold Hamas responsible for all terrorist activity from the Gaza Strip,” the army wrote on Twitter.

Tensions had risen again

The cross-border attacks came amid renewed Israeli-Palestinian tensions. Several Israelis have died in terrorist attacks in recent weeks. At the weekend there were clashes between Palestinians and Israeli police on the grounds of the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem. The situation in Jerusalem was tense because Jewish, Christian and Islamic holidays coincided that year.

Hundreds of Israeli ultra-nationalists waving flags marched toward Palestinian territories around Jerusalem’s Old City on Wednesday. Police forces eventually stopped the march. Militant Palestinian organizations in the Gaza Strip had issued sharp warnings against the march in advance. You have “your finger on the trigger,” it said in a joint statement.