Israel: Israel strikes Gaza after rocket fire on Israeli city claimed by Ahfad al-Sahaba group
Israel carried out airstrikes on Hamas posts in the Gaza Strip after a rocket fired from the Palestinian territory landed in a street in the southern Israeli town of Sderot on Wednesday, the Israeli military said.
Tall plumes of smoke from the Israeli strikes rose up from Gaza following the rare series of airstrikes during daylight. There were at least nine Israeli airstrikes on Hamas posts and open spaces throughout the Gaza Strip, according to Palestinian eyewitnesses, but there were no reports of injuries.
In Israel, no one was wounded by the rocket fire, but it marked an unusual incident of rocket fire penetrating Israel’s aerial defense system. Only a handful of projectiles have struck the previously battered town since the conclusion of a 50-day war between Israel and Gaza militants in the summer of 2014. Sirens wailed in Sderot warning of the incoming rocket, which landed near a school.
A small Islamic group that says it is inspired by, but not officially connected to, the Islamic State group, claimed responsibility for the rocket launch via a statement posted on its Twitter account. The claim could not be independently verified and the group, which calls itself Grandsons of the Companions, is not known to have carried out any previous attacks.