The military said the Iron Dome air defense system intercepted two missiles launched from the Gaza Strip into southern Israel shortly before midnight Thursday, hours after Palestinian factions threatened to retaliate for a deadly raid in the West Bank earlier in the day.
Sirens sounded in the southern coastal city of Ashkelon, as well as in its industrial zone and the neighboring towns of Zikim and Karmiyeh.
Video footage showed Iron Dome interceptor missiles exploding in the air.
The Israeli military said the missiles were shot down by the air defense system.
There were no reports of injuries or damages.
The missile launch came after Nine Palestinians were killed During an Israeli army raid on a cell belonging to the Islamic Jihad Movement in the city of Jenin, in the northern West Bank, on Thursday morning.
And threatened both Islamic Jihad and Hamas, which rules the Gaza Strip, to respond to the dead.
Another clip shows the Iron Dome interceptions over Ashkelon pic.twitter.com/ZOgG6Bu4Fo
– Emmanuel (Manie) Fabian (@maniefabian) January 26, 2023
big officer to reporters After the raid, the Israeli army was “ready and prepared for any scenario”, including possible rocket fire from the Gaza Strip, in response to the deadly clashes.
Over the past year, Islamic Jihad has fired rockets into Israel in response to the killing or arrest of members in the West Bank.
However, there was no immediate claim by any of the Palestinian factions in Gaza of the rocket fire on Thursday.
According to Israeli officials, the Israeli military foiled a “ticking bomb” in Jenin on Thursday after receiving “accurate intelligence” from the Shin Bet security service about the cell’s hideout apartment in the camp.
Nine Palestinians – including several members of the Islamic Jihad cell, other militants, and at least one civilian – were killed and 20 others were injured in the clashes.
The Thursday morning clashes were the deadliest in an Israeli raid in the West Bank in years.
People gather around a building destroyed by Israeli forces in an attempt to thwart an imminent terror attack in the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank on January 26, 2023. (JAAFAR ASHTIYEH / AFP)
Separately, a Palestinian was killed Thursday afternoon in clashes with Israeli forces in the town of Al-Ram, north of Jerusalem, according to the Palestinian Ministry of Health.
Tensions have recently risen in the West Bank as the Israeli military continues its offensive against terror focused mostly on the northern West Bank to deal with a series of attacks that left 31 dead in Israel in 2022.
Jenin is widely viewed by Israeli military officials as a hotbed of terrorist activity, and has been the focus of many raids.
The IDF operation resulted in the arrest of more than 2,500 people in semi-night raids. It also left 171 Palestinians dead in 2022, and as of Thursday, 30 more since the beginning of the year, many of them while carrying out attacks or during clashes with security forces, although some of them were civilians who were not involved.
Mourners carry the bodies of Palestinians who were shot dead by Israeli security forces during an operation in the West Bank city of Jenin, January 26, 2023. (Nasser Ishtayeh/Flash90)
Israel says it holds Hamas responsible for all violence emanating from the Strip and generally responds to rocket fire with air strikes against the group, regardless of who launched the attack.
It was the last time a rocket was fired from the coastal strip towards Israel Jan 3In the wake of Hamas’s threats of retaliation against the visit of the Minister of National Security, Itamar Ben Gvir, to visit the Al-Haram Al-Sharif site, which includes Al-Aqsa Mosque. The missile failed to cross the border.
