The Israeli public radio said that the war jets resumed raids on Hamas targets in response to continued rocket firing towards the Israeli forces that are carrying out works near the security barrier surrounding the Gaza Strip in search of tunnels. One landed in an open field, causing no injuries.
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Israeli tank fire killed a Palestinian woman in her Gaza home on Thursday, in the second day of the worst clashes between Israeli and Palestinian armed groups since the devastating 2014 war.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the rocket launch and most such fire since 2014 has been carried out by fringe Islamist groups but Israel holds Hamas responsible for all such attacks.
These four days of cross-border violence mark the most hostility between Israel and Gaza since Operation Protective Edge in the summer of 2014.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) chief of staff, Gadi Eizenkot, will brief the ministers on the recent developments, while Israeli soldiers continue to uncover underground tunnels dug by Hamas. Hamas seems to be testing Israel’s military and political response to the possibility of another major outbreak of war in the south.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is set to convene senior ministers on Friday to discuss the situation.
Late on Thursday afternoon, tank fire that followed a mortar attack from the Khan Yunis area in southern Gaza killed Zeina Al-Amour, 54, according to the Nasser hospital that pronounced her death.
Israel and Hamas have largely observed a cease-fire since the war, but other militant groups also operate in Gaza.
Such tunnels were among the most feared tools of Hamas fighters during the 2014 conflict which left 2,251 Palestinians and 73 Israelis dead. No Israeli soldiers were reportedly injured.
Using information that Israeli intelligence officers say they gleaned from a Hamas operative arrested last month, Israeli sappers and engineers, protected by ground troops and tanks, have been searching the border perimeter for attack tunnels since Tuesday.
“Hamas’s diabolical plan to infiltrate into Israeli communities must be stopped”, said Lt. Col. Peter Lerner, an Israeli military spokesman.
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However the Shin Bet security service said Thursday a Hamas tunnel expert was arrested in the weeks before the first discovery.
