Israeli air strikes on Gaza killed 13 people early Tuesday, including three leaders of the Islamic Jihad. It is feared that violence will escalate as the militant group vowed to avenge their deaths.
Several children were among the victims of the pre-dawn attack in which more than 40 Israeli jets hit targets for nearly two hours in the crowded coastal enclave.
The Gaza health ministry said four children were among those killed and 20 people were wounded, some of them in serious or critical condition, after the attacks which left buildings ablaze and reduced others to rubble.
Islamic Jihad vowed to “avenge” the deaths as violence flared later in the occupied West Bank when Israeli forces launched a raid in Nablus that left at least a dozen people suffering bullet wounds, according to Palestinian medics.
The Israeli army said that in its Gaza air strikes it had targeted three leaders of Islamic Jihad, which it considers a terrorist group, as well as its “weapon manufacturing sites”.
Israel “achieved what we wanted to achieve” in the operation, said army spokesman Richard Hecht. Asked about child casualties, he said: “If there were some tragic deaths, we’ll look into it.”
Islamic Jihad confirmed the slaying of three of its senior members — Jihad Ghannam, secretary of the Al-Quds Brigades military council, Khalil al-Bahtini, commander of the military wing in northern Gaza, and Tareq Ezzedine, a military leader in the West Bank who operated from Gaza.
Islamic Jihad vowed to retaliate, with spokesman Daoud Shehab warning that “the resistance considers that all cities and settlements in the Zionist (Israeli) depths will be under its fire”.
Hecht said the military instructed Israeli residents within 40 kilometres of the Gaza border to stay near bomb shelters until Wednesday evening.
Israel carried air strikes on Gaza last week in retaliation for rocket fire from the enclave, an exchange sparked by the death in Israeli custody of a Palestinian hunger striker with ties to Islamic Jihad, which ended with an Egypt-brokered truce.
Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh said in a statement on the Gaza attacks that “assassinating the leadership in a treacherous operation will not bring security to the occupier, but instead greater resistance”.
The militant group’s spokesman, Hazem Qassem, warned that Israel “bears responsibility for the repercussions of this escalation”.
Israeli troops later Tuesday raided Nablus in the West Bank. The Palestinian Red Crescent said its medics treated 145 injuries in Nablus, including a dozen people who were shot with live fire and many more who suffered tear gas inhalation.
Tuesday’s deaths bring to 121 the number of Palestinians killed in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict so far this year.
