DUBAI, December 22. /TASS/. At least eight people have been killed in Israeli attacks on several towns in the Gaza Strip, Al Jazeera reported.

According to the TV channel, six people were killed in a bombing attack on a residential building in Deir al-Balah in the enclave’s central part. Two more were killed in the shelling of downtown Khan Yunis in southern Gaza.

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, killing residents of border settlements and seizing more than 240 hostages. 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.