Israel strikes Hamas post in Gaza in response to rocket fire on IAF jets

In response to rocket fire directed at Israeli Air Force jets early Sunday, the Israeli military fired on a Hamas military post, a key rocket manufacturing facility and a terrorist tunnel, all in the southern Gaza Strip.

The rocket-production facility served as the Hamas terrorist organization’s primary manufacturing site in Gaza, producing the majority of Hamas’ rockets.

The IDF described its counteroffensive operation as part of an ongoing strategy to impede Hamas’ weapons buildup in Gaza and as a response to a Hamas rocket attack on Israeli civilian areas on Saturday evening, ending a month of relative calm. Gazan medical sources reported no injuries in the strip as a result of the IAF operation.

The Hamas rocket landed in a field near the communities of Nahal Oz and Kfa Aza in Israel, with no injuries or damage reported. The IDF released a short statement just after 1 a.m. Sunday that it was attacking Gaza in retaliation for the Saturday evening rocket strike.

The IAF jets targeted by Gazan rocket launchers were in the area to respond to the earlier rocket attack. The IAF retaliatory sortie that followed the rocket attack on the planes then struck the manufacturing facility and tunnel.

The incident represents the latest tit-for-tat threatening to send the region spiraling into another round of conflict.

Hamas’ Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades’ armed wing announced after the IAF operation that it targeted the Israeli planes with anti-aircraft fire and surface-to-air missiles.

Israel had concerns that Gaza’s terrorist groups might engage in a retaliatory strike on Israel after the death of two members of the West Bank-based Palestinian Islamic Jihad terrorist group during a military raid.

A previous raid that resulted in the death of a PIJ member had prompted Gaza’s terrorist groups to unleash rockets on Israel on Nov. 3.