JERUSALEM (AFP) – Israeli warplanes hit Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip early on Thursday in response to rocket fire from the territory into southern Israel, the army said.
The fighter jets targeted a military compound in the northern Gaza Strip and a training facility and a munitions manufacturing and storage site in the south, it said in a statement.
Gaza’s Islamist rulers Hamas said there were no casualties in the strikes.
An Israeli army spokeswoman said the raids were in response to a rocket fired from Gaza which caused no casualties or damage but which evaded Israel’s Iron Dome defence system, triggering an inquiry.
It was the first such fire from Gaza since October 17 when a rocket severely damaged a family home in the southern Israeli city of Beersheba, prompting some 20 retaliatory air strikes and the temporary suspension of fuel deliveries to Gaza.
Hamas and its allies disavowed the recent rocket fire blaming fringe groups bent on sabotaging UN and Egyptian efforts to broker a long-term truce in return for a relaxation of Israel’s crippling 11-year blockade of the impoverished territory.
But Israel has vowed repeatedly to hold Hamas to blame for any rocket fire regardless of who launched it.
“The Hamas terror organisation is responsible for all events transpiring in the Gaza Strip and emanating from it,” the army said on Thursday.