[서울=뉴스핌]Reporter Park Gong-sik = On the 23rd (local time), Israel mobilized fighter jets and tanks throughout the Gaza Strip and carried out another large-scale airstrike for the first time in several weeks.
According to Reuters, the Israeli military has again ordered the evacuation of Gaza residents in the north. An Israeli military spokesman ordered residents of Beit Lahiya, in the northernmost part of Gaza, to take refuge in two designated locations as part of an operation to identify terrorists in the area. The airstrikes and artillery shelling in northern Gaza come almost four months after Israel announced the withdrawal of troops.
Residents said that airstrikes and shelling continued non-stop for nearly 24 hours in central and southern Gaza.
The airstrike was carried out after rocket warning sirens sounded in two southern Israeli border villages. The Hamas-linked Islamic Jihad militant faction claimed responsibility for the attacks on the southern Israeli towns of Sidrot and Nir Am.
Thick black smoke rose from everywhere from the southern Israeli border to northern Gaza. Bombardment was intense in Bayit Hanun and Jabalia, and continued shelling in Zaytun.
An airstrike hit a mosque west of Bayit Hanoun, killing one boy and wounding several others. A doctor was killed when a shell fell near the village stadium. Shelling continued east of the southern city of Khan Yunis, where Israeli tanks entered the previous day.
Four people were killed in an Israeli airstrike at the al-Nuseirat refugee camp in central Gaza, and two people were killed in an airstrike at a house east of Rafah in southern Gaza.
| Gaza residents are passing by the remains of a building destroyed by an Israeli airstrike on the 22nd. [사진=로이터] |
