After intercepting a rocket launched from the Gaza Strip, Israel bombards the center of that Palestinian territory

Israel launched airstrikes on the central Gaza Strip early Thursday morning (Wednesday night in Ecuador), hours after intercepting a rocket launched from that Palestinian territory, journalists from AFP and witnesses.

a journalist from AFP saw two more rockets fired at Israel from the Gaza Strip after the Israeli action, and witnesses observed various others released from different points of that territory of 2.3 million inhabitants.

The Israeli army confirmed in a statement issued at 02:41 (19:41 in Ecuador) that it was “attacking the Gaza Strip.”

According to local security sources and witnesses, the first attacks (at least seven) hit a training center of the Al Qassam Brigadesthe armed wing of the Palestinian Hamas movement, in the Al Maghazi refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip.

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a secular armed group, claimed “a volley of rockets (…) in response to the Zionist aggression against the Gaza Strip”.

On the Israeli side, the warning sirens sounded in Sderot, a city in southern Israel close to the Gaza Strip, according to the army. (YO)