DUBAI, May 7. /TASS/. Passenger traffic and the delivery of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip via the Rafah checkpoint in the south of the enclave have been suspended.

According to Al Jazeera, Israeli troops began storming the checkpoint.

Al Mayadeen reported that Israeli troops and heavy military hardware entered the premises of the Rafah checkpoint from the Palestinian side halting its operations.

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, followed by a ground operation in the enclave. Clashes are underway in the West Bank as well.