Israel enters a new war with Hamas after one of the largest attacks from Gaza in the last 20 years

Israel entered a new war with Hamas this Saturday after the militias of the Islamist movement began one of the biggest attacks in memory since they assumed control of the Gaza Strip in 2006, from where they have launched more than 2,200 rockets against southern Israel and large urban centers such as Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, accompanied by an incursion of hundreds of their troops into border towns.

The operation ‘Al Aqsa flood‘ announced by Hamas at around 07:00 this morning, which It has so far cost the lives of 22 people. and left more than 500 injured in Israel, has been immediately responded to by the Hebrew Army with a huge aerial deployment, operation ‘Iron Swords‘, in which dozens of Israeli fighter planes have hit numerous targets of the Islamist movement in the enclave.

Several Palestinians have been killed in this operation, although their exact number is unknown. In addition, and accompanying the barrage of rockets, Hamas forces are carrying out attacks on the ground in seven points in the south of the country: Kfar Aza, Sderot, Sufa, Nahal Oz, Magen, Be’eri and the Re’im military base. , where a still undetermined number of Israeli soldiers would have been captured by Hamas forces, according to the movement itself, although this has not been confirmed by the Israeli Army.

This new war culminates months of tension and violence, particularly in the West Bankwhere dozens of Palestinians have died in Israeli operations and their populations have been objects of attacks by settlers, as well as Israeli residents have died in Palestinian attacks in towns near the settlements.

“Citizens of Israel, we are at war. “This is not an operation or an escalation, but a war,” he said. Netanyahu In his first comment after the beginning of the operation announced this morning by the armed wing of the Islamist movement, the Ezzedin al Qassam Brigades.

“Our country is at war and we are going to win it,” added the prime minister, who has called an emergency meeting of his security council, warning that “our enemy will pay a price it has never known”; a speech with echoes of the great 2014 conflict between Hamas and Israel, when the kidnapping and murder of three Israeli teenagers by the Islamist movement led to a seven-week war in which more than 2,100 Palestinians died in Gaza along with 73 Israelis, including 67 soldiers.

The last large-scale conflict between both sides occurred in May 2021Eleven days of clashes after weeks of tension during Ramadan left at least 260 dead in Gaza and 13 in Israel.

For his part, the Hamas leader, Ismail Haniyedescribed the massive attack launched this morning by the armed wing of the group from Gaza on Israel, one of the most intense since the group assumed control of the enclave in 2006, as a “battle for dignity” in the face of “historic crimes.” ” From Israel.

The Hamas operation takes place in the middle of the Israeli holiday of Simchat Toraha celebration of Judaism’s founding book, and one day after the 50th anniversary of the start of the Arab-Israeli War in October 1973, three weeks of fighting known to Israelis as the Yom Kippur War and to Arabs as the War October.

On that day, Egypt and Syria launched a two-pronged attack on Israel to regain their territories lost in the 1967 Six-Day War, when Israel captured the Sinai Peninsula in Egypt and the Golan Heights in Syria. The conflict ended with the Camp David Accords and the establishment of Egypt as the first Arab country to normalize its relations with Israel.

(With information from Europa Press)