Israeli helicopters hit eastern Gaza City on Sunday night with two air-to-ground missiles, wounding three militants and one child, Palestinian security sources and medics said.
The sources said that two helicopters hovered over eastern Gaza City, and fired two missiles at Sheja'eya neighborhood near the border between eastern Gaza and Israel, adding that residents there heard two huge explosions in the area.
Mo'aweya Hassanein, chief of emergency and ambulance services in the Palestinian health ministry told reporters that three adults and one child were moderately injured by missile fragments.
Israel said its air force carried out airstrikes on eastern Gaza after several homemade rockets at southern Israeli towns and communities in the vicinity of Gaza Strip, and hit homemade rockets launchers.
Israeli launched the airstrikes two days after an Egyptian-brokered six-month truce between Israel and Gaza militants ended. Both sides said the truce period was not extended, and the area would witness more escalation within the coming days.
Earlier on Sunday, a civilian woman was moderately injure, according to Hassanein, by fragments of an Israeli missile in northern Gaza Strip. Several militants in the area escaped the Israeli strike.
Meanwhile, Nemer Hamad, an aide to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas said in a statement that the Palestinian Authority rejects any Israeli military escalation against Gaza Strip.
Several Israeli leaders had earlier threatened that Israel would soon carry out a large-scale military operation against militants and rockets launchers. They said as long as rockets firing at Israel goes on, a military operation would be immanent. Source:Xinhua
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