The escalation of violence between Hamas and Israel continues with the exchange of missiles and more victims

With the missiles fired on Monday by the Islamist group Hamas against Jerusalem, the flames came out of the walls of the Old City and ignited a new escalation between Israel and the militias of the Gaza Strip.. According to health sources in Gaza, 24 Palestinians, including nine children and militants from Hamas and Islamic Jihad – including the head of the missile unit – were killed in retaliatory attacks by the Army, which received the green light for a broad air offensive against infrastructures and leaders of the movement that has controlled the Palestinian enclave since 2007. Military spokesmen speak on Tuesday of 15 members of Palestinian armed groups killed. Two women have died from the direct hit in their house by one of the dozens of projectiles fired at noon by Hamas against the city of Ashkelon.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned Tuesday that Israel will “intensify” its attacks on Hamas after the death of two Israeli women.

“Since yesterday (Monday) the army has carried out hundreds of attacks against Hamas and Islamic Jihad in Gaza (…) and we are going to further intensify the force of our attacks,” said the head of government, in a message from video, adding that Hamas “was going to be hit in a way that was not expected.”

“We deplore the death of two Israelis, I ask you to respect the security instructions,” added Netanyahu, in a speech addressed to his fellow citizens after a meeting to analyze the situation in southern Israel.

“We have hit 130 military targets that mainly belong to Hamas,” including “two offensive tunnels adjacent to the security fence,” weapons factories, and an operation, and tonight they have also bombed homes of Hamas leaders, he told reporters. Israeli Army spokesman Jonathan Conricus. “According to our current estimates, we have killed 15 members of Hamas and Islamic Jihad.”

“We are in the initial phase of our response against military targets in Gaza,” Conricus said.. “We are ready for an escalation”. The rockets launched from the Gaza Strip constitute “a serious aggression against Israel, to which we cannot fail to respond,” he added, in statements collected by Afp.

Local Gaza authorities have reported 22 deaths, including nine children, in the Israeli strikes, the largest since November 2019.. The Israeli Army “neither confirms nor denies” that the death of civilians was a consequence of the bombardments.

After the seven projectiles against the Jerusalem area -one of them hit a house, another was intercepted by the Iron Dome and the rest fell in an open field-, and the anti-tank missile of Islamic Jihad that injured a person in a car in southern Israel, the army fired on several shuttles north of Gaza initiating the “Guardian of the Walls” operation.

“The Izz ad-Din al Qassam Brigades have now launched a burst of missiles against Jerusalem in response to the crimes and attacks,” said the spokesman for the armed wing of Hamas, Abu Oveida, referring to the violent clashes in recent weeks in Haram al-Sharifo the Temple Mount and the Sheikh Jarrah neighborhood, which have turned East Jerusalem into a powder keg. In this way, Hamas punctually complied with the ultimatum that it issued to Israel at 5:00 p.m. to “withdraw its forces from Al Aqsa and Sheikh Jarrah” and release the detainees of the last few days before 6:00 p.m.. At this time, sirens went off in Jerusalem.

“This is a message that the enemy has to understand well,” Oveida added, while another spokesman for the Islamic resistance movement, Fawzy Barhum, blamed Israel and accused it of “not understanding our messages after its attacks against Al Aqsa and our people.” .

Following the attack on Jerusalem, Benjamin Netanyahu hinted that the current standoff may not be brief, warning: “Terrorist groups in Gaza have crossed a red line. We didn't want an escalation but whoever chose to cause it will feel the strength of our arm.”

“The terrorists will pay a very high price for their cowardly attack,” warned a military spokesman who confirmed the death of a commander of the armed wing of Hamas. “We are investigating the information about it, but we attack terrorists who attack our civilians,” he responded about the death of 3 children due to an explosion that, according to the AP agency, initially it was not clear if it was due to an Israeli air strike or a Missing Palestinian projectile.

Although the mediators -Egypt, Qatar and the UN special envoy- intensify their efforts to achieve an immediate ceasefire, both parties believe that the escalation is not a matter of hours but of days. As minimum.

Unpublished since the 2014 war

The launch of projectiles against Jerusalem, unprecedented since the 2014 war, was the prelude to 200 more against southern Israel and interrupted a meeting of the Israeli security cabinet called urgently by the violent clashes in the Esplanade of the Mosques. The Hamas attack surprised military intelligence, whose officials believed that despite warnings from Islamist leaders about Jerusalem, they would not launch a major escalation.. Hence this weekend, the Israeli Army reacted in a very limited way to the projectiles, hoping that the violence in Jerusalem would gradually reduce.

The choice of the emblematic Jerusalem as the initial target expresses Hamas' desire to show solidarity with the Palestinians in the city -they applauded the attack while they were at the Damascus gate-, the will to lead the fight for the cause of Al Quds to the detriment of from its great internal rival Al Fatah and the message that it does not fear an open duel with Israel. Perhaps because he knows that his enemy is trying to avoid him, as reflected in decisions such as not allowing Jews to visit the Esplanade of the Mosques or that the parade of several thousand nationalists on the occasion of the so-called “Jerusalem Day” did not cross the Damascus Gate. , to avoid friction with Palestinians.

Hamas knows Israel is in unprecedented political chaos. After four elections in two years, the crisis translates into the terrible relations between Prime Minister Netanyahu and the Minister of Defense, Benny Gantz, and the possibility that a new government formed by Yair Lapid and Naftali Bennett will be formed in the coming days.. A first political effect of the escalation is that the Israeli Arab Islamist party Raam announced that it is freezing contacts with the representatives of the so-called government of change “until things calm down.”

As evening fell, Israeli shelling and Palestinian shelling continued on both sides of the border between Israel and the Gaza Strip.

Defense Minister Benny Gantz approved this Tuesday the mobilization of 5,000 reservists basically destined for the southern command, Civil Protection and Army operations department, which has also reinforced its deployment of defensive batteries in the central area of Israel.