Israel launched murderous airstrikes on Gaza Monday in response to a blast of rockets fired by Hamas and other Palestinian militants, amid spiraling brutality sparked by the crisis at Jerusalem´s Al-Aqsa Mosque compound.
At least 20 people were killed, including 9 children and a senior Hamas commander, and 65 others injured, Gaza officials said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu threatened that Hamas had crossed a “red line” by directing rockets towards Jerusalem and that the Jewish nation would “answer with force“.
“We will not tolerate attacks on our territory, our citizens, our soldiers, and our capital. Those who strike us will pay a heavy price.”
Israel´s army declared 150 rockets had been launched from Gaza, dozens of which were blocked by the Iron Dome Aerial Defense System, with no fatalities recorded.
Army spokesman Jonathan Conricus told, “We have started, and I repeat started, to strike military destinations in Gaza,”
“We have made arrangements for several situations, including high-intensity ones, Hamas will get the message.”
The military declared it had targeted “two rocket launchers, two military posts“, a tunnel, and 8 Hamas operatives in Gaza.
Hamas specialists confirmed to AFP that one of their chiefs, Mohammed Fayyad, had been hit.
Anxieties in Jerusalem have flared since Israeli disorder police clashed with Palestinian worshippers on the last Friday of the Muslim religious fasting month of Ramadan in the city’s most critical storms since 2017.
Nocturnal pressure since then at the Al-Aqsa compound has left hundreds of Palestinians injured, carrying international calls for de-escalation and intense judgments from across the Muslim world.
Diplomatic authorities informed AFP that Egypt and Qatar, who have negotiated past Israeli-Hamas fights, were endeavoring to calm tensions.
The alarming situation in Jerusalem
Adding to the insight of confusion, a huge fire overwhelmed trees in the compound that houses the mosque, Islam’s third holiest site, as hundreds of Jewish Israelis observed from the Western Wall esplanade below.
Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip, earlier Monday warned Israel to eliminate all its forces from the mosque compound and the East Jerusalem district of Sheikh Jarrah, where looming ejections of Palestinian families have fuelled angry protests.
Sirens lamented across Jerusalem just after the 1500 GMT deadline fixed by Hamas as people in Jerusalem, including administrators in the Knesset chamber, left to bunkers for the first time since a 2014 Gaza fight.
A representative for Hamas‘ armed wing the Qassam Brigades told the rocket attacks was in answer to Israeli actions in Sheikh Jarrah and throughout the Al-Aqsa mosque.
“This is a word that the enemy must know well: if you respond we will respond, and if you escalate we will escalate.”
Are the US authorities care about what happens in Palestine?
The United States declared it “condemns in the most energetic terms the barrage of rocket attacks fired into Israel in recent hours. This is an unacceptable escalation.”
A house in Beit Nekofa, about 10 kilometers west of central Jerusalem, was also destroyed by rocket fire, AFP TV statement.
The Israeli army tweet on Twitter that, separate from the rockets, “as a consequence of an anti-tank missile shot from Gaza, an Israeli civilian in a nearby vehicle was lightly injured” in the Gaza border area.
When will Israelis stop brutal terror attacks on Innocent Palestine people?
Fears of further chaos in the Old City had temporarily been relieved when Israeli organizers of a march to celebrate the Jewish state´s 1967 annexation of east Jerusalem canceled the event.
But then appeared the Hamas warning, accompanied by the rockets, which also attacked the expulsion of the Western Wall and other sites.
Militants in Gaza have recently also expanded ignitable balloons that have sparked dozens of fires in Israeli territory.
Since Friday, Palestinians hurled rocks at Israeli leaders in riot gear who shot rubber bullets, stun grenades, and tear gas.
That came after morning clashes which left the ground littered with stun grenade fragments, rocks, and other debris as loud booms and angry cries echoed from the ancient stone walls.
There were dozens of newly injured demonstrators. The Palestinian Red Crescent had earlier put the damage from Monday’s conflicts at more than 334 injured, including more than 200 who were hospitalized, 5 of them in a serious condition.
The Israeli police reported 32 wounded in their ranks.
The violence since Friday has been fuelled by a long-running bid by Jewish immigrants to expel various Palestinian families from their nearby Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood.
A Supreme Court notice on a Palestinian appeal in the case formerly set for Monday was driven back by the justice ministry due to the pressures.
Palestinian president Mahmud Abbas denounced what he called Israel’s “barbaric aggression”.
