Gaza Strip.. Cautious calm after Israeli raids and rocket fire

Cautious calm returned to the Gaza Strip at dawn today, following Israeli raids and rocket fire from the Strip towards border settlements, while the Israeli army published a video documenting those raids carried out by its aircraft, of an underground tunnel in Gaza that was targeted, according to the Israeli army statement.

Hamas security sources said that Israel had carried out 15 raids on the Strip, while the Qassam Depression announced that it had confronted Israeli fighters with surface-to-air missiles and anti-aircraft missiles.

Prior to that, Al-Arabiya correspondent reported that warning sirens sounded in Ashkelon and the settlements around the Gaza Strip, while Iron Dome intercepted two missiles fired from the Gaza Strip, according to the Israeli army’s statement.

On Friday, the Israeli army launched raids on the central Gaza Strip, where security sources in the Hamas movement reported that 15 Israeli raids targeted some sites in the Strip.

The Al-Qassam Brigades, affiliated with Hamas, announced that it had confronted the Israeli fighters with surface-to-air missiles and anti-aircraft missiles in the sky of Gaza.

While Al-Arabiya correspondent quoted the Israeli army as saying that it had targeted an underground tunnel in the Gaza Strip.

This came after Palestinian militants fired 8 rockets from the Gaza Strip towards southern Israel. Israeli missile defense systems intercepted three of them, according to Palestinian sources.

Sirens sounded later in settlements surrounding the Gaza Strip, as evidence of rockets being fired from the Gaza Strip.

For its part, Washington called for calm, and US State Department spokesman Ned Price said, “Washington urged a de-escalation after the killing of Palestinian gunmen and at least one civilian during an operation carried out by the Israeli army in the West Bank.”

He added, “We stress the urgent need for de-escalation by all parties, to prevent further loss of civilian lives, and to cooperate to improve the security situation in the West Bank.”

The Israeli army announced earlier that it had intercepted two missiles fired from the Gaza Strip towards southern Israel.

The rockets triggered warning sirens in the Israeli areas near the Gaza border.

The rocket fire from the Gaza Strip, which is controlled by the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas), came after an Israeli storming of the city of Jenin in the occupied West Bank today, Thursday, resulted in the largest number of deaths in one day in years.

Israeli television broadcast a video clip of Israeli interceptor missiles over the city of Ashkelon, north of Gaza.

Tensions escalated between the two sides after the Israeli special forces killed 9 Palestinians during the storming of Jenin.

.

Earlier Thursday, the Palestinian presidency decided to stop security coordination with Israel and to immediately go to the Security Council under Chapter VII, while completing the procedures for joining international organizations, in response to the Israeli occupation forces’ storming of Jenin governorate with a military operation and the killing of 9 Palestinians.

The Palestinian News Agency (Wafa) stated that the Palestinian leadership decided to consider that security coordination with the Israeli occupation government “no longer exists as of now.”

This came in a statement issued by an emergency meeting held by the Palestinian leadership, headed by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, to discuss the repercussions of the Israeli military operation in Jenin, which the statement described as a “massacre”, during which the Israeli occupation forces killed 9 Palestinians and injured dozens.

And the Palestinian leadership decided, according to the statement read by the official spokesman for the presidency, Nabil Abu Rudeineh, during a press conference held, Thursday evening, on Palestine TV, “to immediately go to the UN Security Council to implement the international protection resolution for the Palestinian people under Chapter VII and to stop unilateral measures.”

Abu Rudeineh added that the leadership “decided to go urgently to the International Criminal Court, to add the file of the massacre committed by the Israeli occupation forces in Jenin to the files that were previously submitted, and to call immediately for the advent of the ongoing international investigation committee in the Human Rights Council, to investigate and refer its findings regarding the responsibility of the occupation for This massacre is for the International Criminal Court and the Security Council.”

The Palestinian leadership also decided to continue joining the rest of the UN and international organizations, and to move on the Arab, Islamic and international levels in order to support the Palestinian position.

Abu Rudeineh said in the statement, “The president calls on all Palestinian forces to an emergency meeting, to agree on a comprehensive national vision and unite the ranks to confront the Israeli aggression and confront it.”

In an urgent diplomatic move, the observer mission of the State of Palestine to the United Nations and the rest of the international organizations in Geneva and Switzerland sent urgent messages regarding the Israeli attack in the West Bank to the Swiss Foreign Minister, the High Commissioner for Human Rights, the President of the International Red Cross, and the Secretary-General of the Parliamentary Union. International, Director-General of the World Health Organization, Special Rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967 and holders of special mandates, and states parties to the Geneva Conventions.