Israel
Israel’s military says air defenses intercepted all but one of the missiles that landed in a field
Guardians and Agencies
Thursday 23 February 2023 at 02:52 GMT
The Israeli military said Palestinian militants fired six rockets from the Gaza Strip toward southern Israel hours after an Israeli army raid in the occupied West Bank that killed 11 people.
The rocket attacks just before dawn on Thursday morning were not immediately claimed by Palestinian militant groups but appeared to have been triggered by the Nablus raid in which 11 Palestinians were killed.
Israel’s air defenses intercepted five of the missiles fired at the cities of Ashkelon and Sderot, the military said, and one missile landed in an open field. There were no reports of damage or casualties. Warning sirens went off in both cities not far from the Gaza Strip around 4 a.m. local time (0200 GMT), the Israeli army said.
Israeli forces kill 11 in raid on West Bank
Witnesses on the Palestinian side told Agence France-Presse they saw at least eight rockets fired.
A teenager was among the dead in Wednesday morning’s operation in the West Bank that targeted three militants who were staying near the center of Nablus’s old city. All three men wanted were killed along with seven others, including a 72-year-old man. Palestinian officials said at least 103 people were injured, many with gunshot wounds.
The raid was one of the largest in the past year, which has seen the situation in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem steadily deteriorate. A similar raid in January was followed by a Palestinian militant attack near a synagogue in east Jerusalem that killed seven Israelis.
Ziad al-Nakhala, leader of the Gaza Strip-based Islamic Jihad militant group, called the raid a “grave crime” to which “the resistance must respond.”
On Wednesday, US State Department spokesman Ned Price told a regular news conference that Washington acknowledged Israel’s security concerns but was deeply concerned by the large number of casualties and civilian losses.
The violence comes at a critical juncture in Israel-Palestinian relations, with the new Israeli government dominated by ultra-nationalists who have vowed a hard line against militants while pushing for settlement expansion in the West Bank.
Associated Press and Agence France-Presse contributed to this article
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