Ramallah, December 14 (RHC)-- The Israeli air force continues raids against the Gaza Strip amid simmering tensions in the occupied Palestinian territories following the U.S. recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s “capital.”  The Israeli army said on Wednesday that it targeted a Hamas military compound in the southern Gaza Strip in response to what it claimed to be an undefined “projectile” fired from Gaza towards the southern parts of the occupied territories. 

According to Gaza security officials, the Israeli aircraft targeted a Hamas naval base west of the city of Khan Yunis and a nearby open land.  On Tuesday, an Israeli unmanned aerial vehicle carried out an attack in the besieged Gaza Strip, killing at least two people along a road in Um al-Nasser village.  The two slain Palestinians were reportedly members of the engineering unit of al-Quds Brigades, which is the military wing of the Islamic Jihad resistance movement. 

Earlier this week, Israeli forces targeted several positions belonging to the Palestinian resistance movement Hamas in the Gaza Strip with land and air attacks.  The Israeli army claimed that the attacks were in response to rocket fire from the Gaza Strip into an unpopulated area in the occupied territories without causing any injuries. 

The Gaza Strip, home to 1.8 million, has been under an Israeli siege since June 2007. The blockade has caused a decline in the standards of living as well as unprecedented levels of unemployment and unrelenting poverty.  The Tel Aviv regime has also waged several wars on Gaza since 2008, killing and maiming thousands of Gazans. 

The new series of Israeli attacks on Gaza come amid the ongoing tensions across the Palestinian territories after U.S. President Donald Trump announced on December 6th that Washington was recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and tasked the State Department with making preparations for the relocation of Washington’s embassy from Tel Aviv to the occupied Palestinian city. 

The dramatic shift in Washington’s Jerusalem policy drew fierce criticism from the international community, including the United States’ Western allies, and triggered demonstrations against the U.S. and Israel worldwide.