Youmna El Sayed, reporting from Gaza, said that the Ministry of Health declared that 10 people were killed in the Gaza Strip, and an unconfirmed number of people were injured in the Israeli air attacks.
Explosions targeting residential apartments were heard at about 2am local time on Tuesday (23:00 GMT Monday) in different parts of Gaza, El Sayed said.
“It’s not very clear the names of the people who have been killed or the number of people who have been injured. We only have the confirmation that 10, at least 10, have been announced as killed in the latest airstrikes in different areas that are being carried out now along the Gaza Strip,” El Sayed said.
“Whenever there is targeting of residential apartments, there are always casualties [among] civilians,” she added.
Witnesses said an explosion hit the top floor of an apartment building in Gaza City and a house in the southern city of Rafah in the early hours of Tuesday morning.
The latest attacks on Gaza come a week after Israeli missiles pounded the densely-populated strip following rockets fired towards Israel in the aftermath of the death in an Israeli prison of well-known Palestinian hunger striker Khader Adnan.
Armed Palestinian factions launched more rockets in response to the Israeli bombardment, which damaged multiple areas in Gaza, including al-Safina, al-Baydar and near the al-Zaytoun neighbourhood, Al Jazeera’s Maram Humaid reported.
Hashel Mubarak al-Swerki, a 58-year-old father of 11, died after he was severely injured by shrapnel from the Israeli attack northwest of Gaza City. Five other people were also wounds from Israeli missiles east of Beit Hanoun in the north of the besieged strip.
Calm was restored after Qatari, Egyptian and the United Nations officials intervened to broker a ceasefire agreement between Israel and armed Palestinian factions, officials said.
In anticipation of Palestinian rockets being launched in response to the air attacks on Tuesday, Israel’s military issued instructions advising Israeli residents of communities within 40km (25 miles) of Gaza to stay close to designated bomb shelters.
Israeli aircraft conducted strikes early Tuesday on Islamic Jihad targets in the Gaza Strip, the Israeli military said, and the group said three senior commanders were killed in the attacks.
The Palestinian Health Ministry said a number of people were killed and injured in the airstrikes. It did not elaborate. The Israeli military said the aerial bombings were directed at the residences of three senior commanders of the Iranian-backed Islamic Jihad group.
Witnesses said an explosion hit the top floor of an apartment building in Gaza City and a house in the southern city of Rafah. Airstrikes continued in the early hours, targeting militant training sites.
The Israeli army said the aerial bombings, codenamed “Operation Shield and Arrow,” targeted Khalil Bahtini, the Islamic Jihad commander for northern Gaza Strip; Tareq Izzeldeen, the group’s intermediary between its Gaza and West Bank members; and Jehad Ghanam, the secretary of the Islamic Jihad’s military council. It added the three were responsible for recent rocket fire toward Israel.
Islamic Jihad, which is smaller than the dominant, ruling Hamas movement, confirmed that the three were among the dead.
The airstrikes come as tension boils between Israel and militants in the Gaza Strip, which is ruled by the militant Hamas group. The tension is linked to increasing violence in the occupied West Bank, where Israel has been conducting near daily raids for the past months to detain Palestinians suspected in planning or carrying out attacks on Israelis.
In anticipation of Palestinian rocket attacks in response to the airstrikes, the Israeli military issued instructions advising residents of communities within 25 miles (40 kilometers) of Gaza to stay close to designated bomb shelters.
Last week, Gaza militants fired several salvos of rockets toward southern Israel, and Israeli military responded with airstrikes following the death of a hunger-striking senior member of the Islamic Jihad in Israeli custody. The exchange of fire ended with a fragile ceasefire mediated by Egypt, the United Nations, and Qatar.
The airstrikes are similar to ones in 2022 in which Israel bombed places housing commanders of Islamic Jihad group, setting off a three-day blitz that saw the group loosing its two top commanders and other dozens of militants.
Israel says the raids in the West Bank are meant to dismantle militant networks and thwart future attacks. The Palestinians see the attacks as further entrenchment of Israel’s 56-year, open-ended occupation of lands they seek for a future independent state.
So far, 105 Palestinians, about half of them are militants or alleged attackers, were killed by Israeli fire in the West Bank and east Jerusalem since the start of 2023, according to an Associated Press tally.