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It was the latest sign of heightened tensions during the delicate holiday period. A similar battle in 2021 led to his 11-day war between Israel and Hamas.
The airstrikes came after Lebanese militants fired a large number of rockets into Israel earlier in the day, driving people across Israel’s northern border into air raid shelters and injuring at least two people. also fired rockets at Israel.
Israeli military officials said rocket launches on both fronts were linked to this week’s violence at the Al-Aqsa Mosque in the heart of Jerusalem’s old city, where Israeli police stormed the building with tear gas and stun grenades. said it was carried out by Palestinian militants. Two days in a row. Violent scenes at the mosque have heightened tensions across the region.
The airstrike occurred as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was meeting with the Security Cabinet to discuss rocket launches. After nearly three hours of meetings, Netanyahu’s office issued a brief statement that a series of decisions had been made.
“Israel’s response tonight and beyond will come at a heavy price from its enemies,” Netanyahu said. It didn’t elaborate.
There was no immediate Israeli action in Lebanon, where militants have fired about 34 rockets across the border. The military said 25 aircraft were shot down by the Iron Dome air defense system. Five rockets hit Israeli territory and the rest are under investigation. Israel said two people were injured.
With Israel’s bitter enemy, the Iran-backed extremist group Hezbollah, controlling much of southern Lebanon, the unusually large salvo of rockets has sparked fears of a wider conflagration. Over the past two days, tensions have soared along the sanctuary of Jerusalem’s Al-Aqsa Mosque and Israel’s strained border with Gaza.
In a briefing with reporters, Israeli military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Richard Hecht said the military had drawn a clear link between the Lebanese rocket fire and the recent unrest in Jerusalem.
“This is an event for Palestine,” he said, adding that either Hamas or Islamic jihadist militant groups based in Gaza but also active in Lebanon may be involved. But he said the military believes Hezbollah and the Lebanese government are aware of what happened and are also responsible. He declined to say how Israel would respond, saying there were “all kinds of scenarios.”
In the early hours of Thursday and late Wednesday night, Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip fired several rockets into Israel as Israeli police fired tear gas and stun grenades into the Al-Aqsa Mosque in the heart of Jerusalem’s Old City. protested against entering the On Thursday, Hezbollah condemned Israel’s attack on al-Aqsa. His third holiest site in Islam, this temple sits on a hill revered by Jews as Temple Mount, the holiest site in Judaism.
In Lebanon, no faction claimed responsibility for the rocket salvo that sirensed air raids in northern Lebanon.
A Lebanese security official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, said the country’s security forces said the rockets were fired by a Lebanese-based Palestinian militant group, not by Hezbollah militants. He said he believed he was. Officials said there were no casualties on the Lebanese side.
A Hezbollah spokesman did not respond to a request for comment. Israel and Hezbollah have avoided all-out confrontation since her 34-day war ended in a draw in 2006.
Tensions are rising along the Lebanese border.Israel appears to be stepping up its shadow war against Iran-related targets in Syria, another close ally of Israel’s arch-nemesis Iran in the region. Suspected Israeli airstrikes in Syria in recent weeks have killed two Iranian military advisers and temporarily disabled two of the country’s largest airports. Hecht said Thursday’s rocket launches were not believed to be linked to events in Syria.
In Washington, Deputy State Department Press Secretary Vedant Patel said, “Israel has legitimate security concerns and has every right to defend itself.”
But he also urged tranquility in Jerusalem. “We stress the importance of maintaining the historical status quo in the Holy Land of Jerusalem and unilateral actions that endanger the status quo are unacceptable,” he said.
At least two people were injured in Israel on Thursday after debris from rockets fired from Lebanon splattered, according to the Galilee Medical Center. Israeli police said bomb squads cleared a large amount of debris from northern areas.
Videos on social media show black smoke rising from hills in northern Israel and streaks across the sky left by the iron dome defense system. Widely circulated photographs show at least one building where debris has pierced the streets of the northern Israeli town of Shlomi, with windows blown out.
The Lebanese army said it had found missile launchers and “a number of rockets intended for launch” near the towns of Djiboutin and Kalila in southern Lebanon and was working to dismantle them.
The Palestinian militant group Islamic Jihad hailed the rockets as “a heroic operation against Israeli crimes at the Al-Aqsa Mosque.”
Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of the Palestinian militant group Hamas, which governs Gaza, visited Lebanon and met with deposed leaders of the Palestinian militant group late Thursday. “Our Palestinian people will not remain passive to the ongoing aggression,” he said.
Tensions rose in Jerusalem after two nights of turmoil. Al-Aqsa’s conflicting claims over the sacred grounds that are home to his mosque have escalated into violence in the past, including his bloody 11-day war between Israel and Hamas in 2021.
Palestinians barricaded mosques with stones and firecrackers over the past two nights during a volatile period that coincides with the Muslim holy month of Ramadan and the Jewish holiday of Passover. Worshipers have demanded the right to pray overnight inside the mosque. Authorities usually only allow him the last 10 days of a month’s vacation. They also remain in mosques to protest threats by religious Jews to perform ritual animal slaughter on Passover holy sites.
Israel bans ritual slaughter on premises, but Jewish extremists call to revive practices, including offering cash rewards to anyone trying to bring animals onto premises increasing fears among Muslims that Israel is plotting to take over the premises
Early Wednesday morning, Israeli police stormed the mosque, firing stun grenades and rubber bullets to evict worshipers who locked the building’s doors. Palestinians threw stones and fireworks at police officers. was arrested. Israeli authorities control access to the area, but the facilities are controlled by Islamic and Jordanian officials.
Violence on the ground has spread throughout the region, prompting an outpouring of condemnation from Muslim leaders.
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