DUBAI, May 7. /TASS/. At least 20 people died as a result of the Israel Defense Forces’ (IDF) strikes on targets in the city of Rafah in the southern Gaza Strip, Qatar’s Al Jazeera reported, citing medics.

According to the channel, Israeli warplanes also targeted a school housing displaced people in the Al-Shati refugee camp. The strikes killed one person and wounded others.

On May 6, the Times of Israel reported that the IDF had begun evacuating civilians from Rafah’s eastern neighborhoods, preparing for a planned military operation. That evening, the IDF press service announced that the military had attacked more than 50 radical targets in the Rafah area during the day. Later, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office said that the country's military cabinet had unanimously decided to continue the operation in Rafah in order to put pressure on Hamas. On May 7, the IDF took control of the Palestinian side of the Rafah border crossing on the Gaza Strip's border with Egypt. According to the Israeli army's press service, the military launched a precise counter-terrorism operation in the eastern part of Rafah.

Tensions flared up again in the Middle East on October 7, 2023, when militants from the Gaza Strip-based radical Palestinian movement Hamas staged a surprise attack on Israeli territory from Gaza, killing residents of Israeli border settlements and taking over 240 hostages, including women, children and the elderly. In response, Israel launched an operation in the Gaza Strip to destroy the military and political structure of Hamas and to free all hostages.

With the military operation continuing now for more than six months, the international community has recently stepped up pressure on the Israeli authorities, calling for an early cessation of hostilities in the enclave and the abandonment of plans to deploy troops to Rafah. Israeli authorities insist that the Rafah operation is necessary for a "total victory" and the defeat of Hamas militias in Gaza.