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JERUSALEM, April 7 (AP) — The Israeli military struck targets in the Gaza Strip early Friday, firing rockets along the country’s northern and southern borders following two days of unrest at Jerusalem’s most sensitive holy site , bringing the area closer to the site of the wider fire.
At least two loud bangs could be heard in Gaza. It was not immediately clear what was hit.
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The airstrikes followed earlier in the day when militants in Lebanon fired a volley of rockets into Israel, forcing people on Israel’s northern border into bomb shelters, injuring at least two people. In Gaza, militants also fired rockets into Israel.
Israeli military officials say rocket fire from Palestinian militants on two fronts is linked to this week’s violence at the Al-Aqsa Mosque in the heart of Jerusalem’s Old City, as Israeli police stormed the building with tear gas and stun grenades . For two days in a row. Violent scenes at the mosque have heightened tensions across the region.
The strike came as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was meeting with his security cabinet to discuss the rocket attack. He vowed to “respond positively”.
“We will strike our enemies and they will pay for every act of aggression,” he said, adding that despite political divisions, Israelis remained united in the face of external threats.
There was no immediate Israeli response in Lebanon, where militants fired some 34 rockets towards the Lebanese border. The military said 25 planes were shot down by the Iron Dome air defense system. Five rockets hit Israeli territory and the remaining attacks are under investigation. Israel said two people were wounded.
The unusually large volley of rockets raised concerns about wider fires as Israel’s sworn enemy, the Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah, controls much of southern Lebanon. Tensions have escalated sharply over the past two days over the holy compound that houses the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem and along Israel’s tense border with Gaza.
Briefing reporters, Israeli military spokesman Lt. Col. Richard Hecht said the military was linking the Lebanese rocket attack to the recent unrest in Jerusalem.
“This is a Palestinian-oriented event,” he said, adding that either Hamas or Islamic Jihad, which is based in Gaza but also operates in Lebanon, could be involved.
But he said the military believed Hezbollah and the Lebanese government knew what happened and were responsible. He declined to say how Israel might respond, saying there was a “variety of scenarios”.
Palestinian militants in the Gaza Strip fired several rockets into Israel early Thursday and late Wednesday night in protest against Israeli police storming the Al-Aqsa Mosque in the heart of Jerusalem’s Old City using tear gas and stun grenades.
On Thursday, Hezbollah condemned Israel’s attack on al-Aqsa. The Holy Land is the third holiest site in Islam and sits atop a mountain revered by Jews as the Temple Mount, the holiest site in Judaism.
No faction in Lebanon has claimed responsibility for the salvo of rockets that sounded the sirens of air strikes in the north of the country.
A Lebanese security official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the country’s security forces believed the rockets had been fired by the Lebanon-based Palestinian militant group and not by Hezbollah militants. There were no casualties on the Lebanese side, the official said.
A spokesman for Hezbollah did not respond to a request for comment. Both Israel and Hezbollah have avoided full-scale conflict since a 34-day war in 2006 that ended in a draw.
Tensions have risen on the Lebanese border as Israel appears to have escalated its shadow war against Iranian-linked targets in Syria, another close ally of Iran, Israel’s archenemy in the region. In recent weeks, suspected Israeli airstrikes in Syria have killed two Iranian military advisers and temporarily rendered the country’s two largest airports unusable. Hecht said Thursday’s rocket launch was not believed to be related to events in Syria.
In Washington, State Department chief deputy spokesman Vedant Patel said, “Israel has legitimate security concerns and has every right to defend itself.”
But he also urged calm in Jerusalem.
“We stress the importance of preserving the historical status quo at the Holy Land in Jerusalem, and any unilateral action that jeopardizes the status quo is unacceptable,” he said.
In Israel, shrapnel from a rocket fired from Lebanon on Thursday injured at least two people, according to the Galilee Medical Center. Israeli police said bomb squads removed some debris from the northern area.
Videos on social media showed huge plumes of black smoke billowing from mountains in northern Israel, with the Iron Dome defense system streaking the sky. Widely circulated photos showed shrapnel punching a hole in a street in the northern Israeli town of Shlomi, blowing out the windows of at least one building.
The Lebanese military said it had found missile launchers and “some rockets ready to fire” near the towns of Zibqin and Qalila in southern Lebanon and was working to dismantle them.
Islamic Jihad, a Palestinian militant group, hailed the rockets as a “heroic action against the crimes committed by Israel at the al-Aqsa mosque”.
Ismail Haniyeh, the leader of Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that rules Gaza, is visiting Lebanon, where he met with exiled Palestinian militant leaders late Thursday. “Our Palestinian people will not remain passive to the ongoing aggression,” he said.
In Jerusalem, tensions rose after two nights of unrest. Conflicting claims to the holy site that houses the Al-Aqsa Mosque have turned violent in the past, including a bloody 11-day war between Israel and Hamas in 2021.
For the past two nights – a turbulent time when the Muslim holy month of Ramadan overlaps with the Jewish holiday of Passover – Palestinians have locked themselves in mosques with stones and firecrackers.
Worshipers have been demanding the right to pray overnight inside mosques – authorities usually only allow prayers during the final 10 days of the month-long holiday.
They also remained at the mosque in protest against religious Jews threatening to perform animal slaughter rituals at the holy site for Passover.
Israel has banned ritual killings at the site, but Jewish extremists have called for the practice to be revived, including offering cash rewards to anyone who tries to bring animals into the compound, fueling fears among Muslims that Israel is plotting to take over the site
Earlier Wednesday, Israeli police raided mosques, firing stun grenades and rubber bullets to drive away worshipers from locked doors. Palestinians threw stones and fireworks at police.
After hours of scuffling, leaving marks, police managed to drag everyone out of the compound. Police violently beat Palestinians and arrested more than 400 people. Israeli authorities control access to the area, but the compound is run by Islamic and Jordanian officials.
The violence at the scene resonated across the region, with Muslim leaders condemning it. (Associated Press)
(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from a Syndicated News feed, the content body may not have been modified or edited by LatestLY staff)
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