Jerusalem, March 8. A failed rocket launch from the Gaza Strip sparked air raid alarms in southern Israel early Wednesday as Israeli security forces were on high alert after carrying out a raid in the occupied West Bank that left six deaths among the Palestinian militants.

“A rocket launch that appears to have exploded inside the Gaza Strip has been identified,” an Israeli military spokesman said, adding that anti-aircraft sirens were activated at Nir Am, an Israeli town near the coastal enclave.

On Tuesday, Israeli forces raided the Jenin refugee camp, a stronghold of armed Palestinian resistance in the northern occupied West Bank, in search of the suspected perpetrator of an attack that killed two Jewish settlers on February 26 near the Palestinian town of Huwara.

During the raid, Israeli agents killed the alleged attacker and five other militants, in addition to wounding twenty Palestinians, two of them seriously.

It is the deadliest Israeli operation in the West Bank since the start of 2023, amid a serious upsurge in violence in the context of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Palestinian militias in Gaza often send rockets into Israel in retaliation for killing their fighters, but these rockets, often crudely constructed, can fail and fail to reach Israeli territory.

In response to these rockets, Israel regularly bombs the narrow strip, where two million Palestinians live, with its warplanes.

On Tuesday, Israeli authorities declared themselves on high alert for fear of reprisals for the raid in Jenin, whose priority target was the suspected perpetrator of the Huwara attack, identified as Abd al Fatah Husein Ibrahim Garusha, 49 years.

According to Israeli agents, Garusha was a member of the Islamist movement Hamas, which rules Gaza de facto and whose military wing is considered a terrorist group by Israel, the United States and the European Union.

Palestinian Prime Minister Mohamed Shtayeh called the raid a “horrific massacre” and called on the United States to intervene to stop the destruction of Palestinian towns, villages and refugee camps by Israeli forces, the news agency reported. Palestinian official, WAFA.

So far this year, at least 71 Palestinians have been killed in clashes and other violent incidents with Israel. On the Israeli side, 14 people were killed by attacks by Palestinians during the same period.

Israel took control of the West Bank in 1967, and maintains one of the longest military occupations in recent history. EFE

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