MOSCOW, October 26. /TASS/. Israel’s self-defense should not entail the killing of innocent civilian residents of the Gaza Strip, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov, who also serves as Special Presidential Envoy for the Middle East and Syria, said.

"Self-defense, certainly, should not involve the physical elimination of an enormous number of absolutely innocent residents in Gaza, that’s two-and-a-half million people," the diplomat said, speaking before the Imperial Orthodox Palestine Society.

Tensions flared up again in the Middle East on October 7 when militants from the Gaza-based Palestinian radical group Hamas staged a surprise incursion into Israeli territory from the Gaza Strip. Hamas described its attack as a response to the aggressive actions of Israeli authorities against the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem’s Old City. In response, Israel has announced a total blockade of the Gaza Strip, home to 2.3 million Palestinians, and has begun delivering air strikes on the enclave and certain parts of Lebanon and Syria. Clashes are underway in the West Bank as well.