Eight Palestinians were killed yesterday in Israel Defense Forces offensives in the Gaza Strip.
In addition, Khaled Wahabeh, an 18-month-old baby who was wounded in the IDF's bombing of Khan Yunis last month, died at a Gazan hospital yesterday.
The IDF continues to prepare for a renewed expansion of offensive activity in the Strip as part of Operation Summer Rains.
A Hamas operative was killed before dawn by an Israel Air Force missile attack in the Sajaiyeh neighborhood of Gaza City. The army said he was part of a cell that was hit on its way to launch Qassam rockets. Two Islamic Jihad operatives were killed at noon by missiles while crawling toward the perimeter fence, south of Kissufim Crossing. The army said the pair wanted to plant explosive devices.
Another two attacks occured yesterday evening: the IAF fired missiles at a cell armed with anti-tank rockets west of Karni Crossing, killing one Hamas operative and wounding three other Palestinians.
Immediately afterward, an IDF force fired at a group of Palestinians in Beit Hanun killing three, aged 17 to 19, and wounding two. The circumstances of this incident are unclear.
The IDF claims that a few minutes earlier, a Qassam launch from a soccer field was identified, and the troops fired at people in the vicinity of the launchers. Apparently, operatives fired Qassam rockets from launchers that were placed some 300 meters from the soccer field of a college in Beit Hanun and left the scene. For some reason, the youths who were hit had decided to approach the launchers, which is when an IDF missile hit them.
In another air assault, an Islamic Jihad weapons storehouse was bombed in eastern Gaza City.
A 21-year-old Palestinian who was wounded in the morning by IDF fire in the northern Gaza Strip died in the afternoon at a hospital.
Military sources said that heightened deployment of surveillance and firing measures along the Gaza Strip border made it possible to deal more rapidly and effectively with Qassam and anti-tank cells. Ground activity in the Strip also will resume in the next few days, with infantry and armored forces dispatched to raid Palestinian communities.
Islamic Jihad and Fatah's military wing, the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades, yesterday claimed they had fired a Qassam rocket from the Jenin area toward Moshav Ram-On in the Jezreel Valley. The rocket landed in Palestinian territory. IDF sources said that no such launch had been identified.
Three Qassam rockets were fired yesterday from the Gaza Strip, two of which landed in Israel but led to no casualties.
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