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Israeli-Palestinian conflict

Over 100 mosques, three churches destroyed in Gaza in Israel’s strikes — Hamas

It condemned the strike on the Great Omari Mosque, one of the oldest mosques in the Gaza Strip, which led to its partial destruction

CAIRO, December 8. /TASS/. More than 100 mosques and three Christian churches have been destroyed as a result of Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip, the radical Palestinian movement Hamas said.

"In the course of the ongoing aggression in Gaza, Israeli forces have struck most of the historical monuments in the Palestinian enclave," it said in a statement. According to Hamas, as many as 104 mosques and three churches have been destroyed in bombardments as of today.

It condemned the strike on the Great Omari Mosque, one of the oldest mosques in the Gaza Strip, which led to its partial destruction. It slammed this attack as a "barbaric crime against a religious and historic monument." Nevertheless, "such methods cannot break the will of the Palestinian people and its resistance to the aggression," Hamas stressed.

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.

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Israeli-Palestinian conflict

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