GAZA CITY: Israeli forces shot dead two Palestinian teenagers in the Gaza Strip, medical sources said on Sunday, as tensions rose after an apparent bomb attack that wounded several Israeli soldiers on the enclave’s border. The Saturday explosion and ensuing Israeli air strikes marked one of the most serious escalations in the Hamas-ruled territory since the movement and Israel fought a war in 2014. Israel’s army said it attacked “18 targets belonging to the Hamas” in two waves of air strikes. “Eight targets were attacked in a military compound near Deir el Balah, which belongs to the Hamas, including weapon-manufacturing and training infrastructures,” it said in a statement.
Earlier the army said fighter jets had targeted “six military targets in Gaza belonging to Hamas, including: a tunnel in the Zaytun area and military compounds near Deir el-Balah and Khan Yunis”. Two Palestinians were injured in air strikes which hit three bases belonging to Hamas in the east of the blockaded Gaza enclave, Palestinian sources said.
Speaking at a security conference in Munich late on Saturday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had called the border blast “very serious” and pledged to “respond appropriately”. According to witnesses, the two dead Palestinians were shot by Israeli forces near the border on Saturday.
They were identified by the Gaza health ministry as Salam Sabah and Abdullah Abu Sheikha, both 17, who were killed east of Rafah in the south of the enclave.
They were buried on Sunday.
The Israeli army said that its forces had fired “warning shots” at a number of Palestinians approaching the border fence “in a suspicious manner”.
Four Israeli soldiers were wounded, two severely, when an improvised explosive device blew up along the Gaza border fence, but none of their lives were in danger, the army said.
According to Palestinian security sources, the explosion took place east of the city of Khan Yunis.
In response Israeli forces said a tank promptly opened fire at an “observation post” in southern Gaza, causing no injuries on the Palestinian side. A projectile launched from the Gaza Strip hit near a home in a southern Israeli community, damaging a building but causing no injuries, Israeli authorities said. — AFP
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