Israeli air strike kills child in Gaza: Palestinian official
AFP
March 12, 2016 10:33 MYT
March 12, 2016 10:33 MYT
Smoke and fire billow following an Israeli air strike, on July 11, 2014 in Rafah, in the southern of Gaza Strip. Israeli warplanes kept up deadly raids on Gaza but failed to stop Palestinians firing rockets across the border. AFP / SAID KHATIB
Israeli planes struck Hamas bases in the Gaza Strip early Saturday, killing a child living near one of the targets and injuring his sister, Gaza health ministry spokesman Ashraf al-Qudra said.
Yasin Abu Khussa, 10, died in a raid on a base of the group's military wing, the Ezzedine al-Qassem Brigades, at Beit Lahiya in the north of the strip, he said -- one of four strikes the Israeli military said it carried out in response to rocket fire into Israel.
His sister Yasmin, 6, was seriously wounded and his brother Ayub, 13, suffered moderate injuries, al-Qudra told AFP.
The strikes came hours after four rockets fired from the Gaza Strip by Palestinian militants hit neighbouring Israel Friday night without apparent casualties, the Israeli army said.
"In response to the aggression, the Israel Air Force targeted four Hamas sites in the northern Gaza Strip," a military statement said.
"There have been seven rockets fired at Israel from the Gaza Strip since the beginning of the year."
Since the end of the devastating war between Israel and Gaza militants in summer 2014, approximately 34 projectiles fired from the Hamas-controlled Palestinian coastal strip have hit the Jewish state, according to military data.
Sunni Muslim militants claiming links to the Islamic State jihadist group have said they were behind rocket fire in recent months, but Israel holds Hamas responsible for all such incidents.