DUBAI, February 10. /TASS/. At least 15 people were killed in an overnight shelling attack on the city of Rafah in the south of the Gaza Strip by the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), Al Jazeera reported.

According to the TV channel, there are also "many wounded people" in the city but their number has not been specified.

Tensions flared up again in the Middle East on October 7, 2023, 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 declared a state of war readiness; announced a total blockade of the Gaza Strip, home to 2.3 million Palestinians; and began delivering air strikes on the enclave and certain parts of Lebanon and Syria. Clashes are underway in the West Bank as well.