CAIRO, December 8. /TASS/. The Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the Hamas movement, said its militants killed or injured dozens of Israeli soldiers over the past three days, the group’s spokesman Abu Ubayda said in a statement, posted on Hamas Telegram channel.

"Our mujahideen killed and injured dozens of Zionist soldiers, blowing up several tunnels and buildings with enemy soldiers inside <…> or in clashes with them," he said.

Tensions flared up again in the Middle East on October 7 after militants from the Gaza Strip-based radical Palestinian group Hamas launched a surprise incursion on Israeli territory, killing many Israeli kibbutz residents living near the Gaza border and abducting more than 200 Israelis, including women, children and the elderly. Hamas described its attack as a response to Israeli authorities’ aggressive actions against the Al-Aqsa Mosque on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem’s Old City. Israel declared a total blockade of the Gaza Strip and launched bombardments of the enclave and some areas in Lebanon and Syria, as well as a ground operation against Hamas in the Gaza Strip. Clashes are also reported in the West Bank.