Israel has seized 30,000 explosives in the Gaza Strip since Hamas launched a war on October 7, a spokesman for the Israeli government confirmed on Tuesday.
Eylon Levy told reporters during a briefing that while there was no deadline for eliminating Hamas’s rocket-launching capacity, Israel sought to achieve that goal.
Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesman Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari had mentioned the figure of 30,000 on Saturday, and Levy confirmed that the figure included rockets found ready for firing at Israeli cities.
Separately, the IDF reported Tuesday that it had found a cache of weapons in a children’s bedroom in a civilian home in Gaza:
In recent days, the 931st Battalion and the Nahal Brigade forces killed many terrorists in close-quarters combat in the Tuffah area in the northern Gaza Strip. Due to the high number of close-quarters combats and the presence of many terrorists and weapons, the forces carried out an operation in the area.
Inside a children’s bedroom in a civilian house, the forces discovered dozens of Kalachnikovs, grenades, Bazukas, RPG rocket heads, and Israeli license plates.
The weapons found are further proof of Hamas’ attempt at hiding weapons and terror activity behind civilian population and infrastructure.
Rocket fire has slowed, but not stopped, since Israel began its ground offensive in late October. Sirens sounded in the coastal city of Ashkelon on Tuesday, and the Iron Dome missile defense system was used to eliminate rockets fired from the Gaza Strip.
The rockets are presumed to come from the central Gaza Strip, the one area where the IDF has not yet made significant inroads.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the new biography, Rhoda: ‘Comrade Kadalie, You Are Out of Order’. He is also the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.