According to the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), Israeli forces launched a new operation in the central Gaza Strip in the early hours of Thursday.
The announcement referred to “a precise, intelligence-led operation to eliminate terrorist operatives and attack terrorist infrastructure in the central Gaza Strip.”
Israeli fighter jets attacked targets above and below ground before IDF ground forces invaded, it said.
The military said its troops “identified an armed terrorist who exited a terror tunnel shaft alongside IDF troops and entered a military structure.” A fighter jet targeted him as he approached the IDF troops.
Several rocket launcher ramps were found and the Israeli navy fired on several targets in the area, it said.
Rescue workers on the scene reported that at least five Palestinians had died in an apartment block in the Nuseirat refugee camp, southwest of Gaza City.
In southern Gaza, six people were killed in Rafah in a suspected airstrike by Israeli forces on the town on the Egyptian border, Palestinian medics in the area said.
An IDF spokesman declined to comment on the specific incident, but said that the IDF would “dismantle Hamas’s military and administrative capabilities” in response to the “barbaric attacks” by the Palestinian militant organization Hamas.
He added: “In stark contrast to Hamas’s deliberate attacks on Israeli men, women and children, the IDF follows international law and takes practical precautions to reduce harm to civilians.”
A key Hamas financier was also killed in an airstrike in the Gaza Strip, the IDF said.
Nasser Yakob Jabber Nasser “was responsible for financing a significant portion of Hamas’ military activities in Rafah,” the military said. Last December he transferred hundreds of thousands of dollars to Hamas, they said.
More than a million refugees are crowding into Rafah. Despite international warnings, Israel is planning a military operation there to dismantle what it says are the last Hamas battalions.
According to Hamas-controlled health authorities, more than 33,500 people have been killed in the Gaza Strip since the start of the war, which was sparked by Hamas-led attacks on Israel more than six months ago. More than 76,000 Palestinians were injured. The numbers do not differentiate between combatants and civilians.
The Oct. 7 attack by Hamas and other Palestinian militants on the Israeli border area killed more than 1,200 people and kidnapped more than 250 people into the Gaza Strip, according to Israeli media.
Earlier this week, the IDF withdrew most of its forces from parts of the southern Gaza Strip. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu nonetheless insists that a ground attack on the remaining intact Hamas forces in Rafah is imminent, despite international calls for it to be called off.