At least 10 Israelis were wounded in a Hamas-claimed rocket attack on an area near the Gaza Strip on Sunday, prompting the military to shutter a key border crossing.
More than 10 rockets and mortars were fired from the Rafah area in southern Gaza in the attack, according to the Israel Defense Forces.
The Hamas terror group said it had launched a barrage of short-range rockets at a gathering of Israeli troops on the border, near the southern community of Kerem Shalom.
Most of the rockets struck an area near the Kerem Shalom border crossing, which has been used to deliver thousands of truckloads of humanitarian aid to Gaza amid the war.
The victims were taken to hospitals by ambulance, aside from one who was airlifted.
Sirens had sounded in Kerem Shalom during the attack, and one of the rockets hit a home in the community. Towns close to the enclave have been largely evacuated of civilians since the devastating Hamas-led onslaught on October 7.
The IDF said it had shuttered the Kerem Shalom Crossing for humanitarian aid trucks following the attack.
According to the military, the rocket attack was carried out from an area close to the Rafah Crossing with Egypt, some 350 meters from a civilian shelter.
The IDF said the attack was “another clear example of the systematic exploitation that the Hamas terror organization makes of humanitarian facilities and spaces for terror needs, while using the civilian population as a human shield.”
The IDF also carried out strikes in Rafah in response, including hitting the launchers and an adjacent building used by Hamas, the military said.
More than a million Palestinian civilians are sheltering in Gaza’s southernmost city, considered to be the Hamas terror group’s last major redoubt.
Israel has repeatedly indicated it could launch an offensive in Rafah imminently should talks for a truce and hostage deal talks break down.
During a visit Sunday to the central Gaza Strip, Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said Israel had identified signs that Hamas was not interested in a hostage deal, and in turn, the military would launch its offensive in Rafah in “the very near future.”
“We have clear goals for this war, we are committed to the elimination of Hamas and the release of the hostages. We have given [Hamas] time and we wanted to reach a situation where we would realize the release of the hostages as quickly as possible, with a certain delay in the operational action, because the hostages are in a difficult situation and we need to make every effort to release them,” Gallant said to troops in central Gaza’s Netzarim Corridor.
“We have identified alarming signs that Hamas actually does not intend to go for any agreement framework with us. The meaning of this [is] action in Rafah and the entire Gaza Strip in the very near future,” he said.
Earlier Sunday, the military said it had killed a senior Hamas commander in the terror group’s Bureij Battalion was killed in a recent airstrike.
The IDF said that Saleh Jamil Muhammad Imad, head of the Bureij Battalion’s combat support unit, was killed alongside several other Hamas operatives at the targeted site in central Gaza.
Another airstrike killed three Hamas terrorists, members of the group’s elite Nukhba force, who participated in the October 7 onslaught, according to the IDF.
The IDF said a separate strike in northern Gaza’s Jabaliya killed three Hamas operatives, including a deputy company commander.
Overnight, the IDF carried out artillery shelling against a Hamas rocket launching site in Gaza that the military said was primed for attacks on southern Israel.
Fighter jets also hit several more sites across Gaza, including buildings used by terror groups, weapon depots and other infrastructure, the IDF said. One of the buildings was struck after a sniper was identified in it, according to the army.
The airstrikes came as ground troops of the 99th Division continued to operate in central Gaza’s Netzarim Corridor.
Israel says it has killed at least 13,000 fighters inside Gaza, along with around 1,000 killed inside Israel on October 7 and in the days immediately after.
Gaza’s Hamas-controlled health ministry says over 34,000 Palestinians have been killed in the Israeli offensive, a figure which cannot be confirmed. The ministry does not differentiate between civilians and combatants.