by As Israel wages a war in Gaza aimed at dismantling Hamas’s military capabilities, the armed group and its affiliates have continued to fire rockets into Israel almost daily, targeting deep within its borders and attacking some of the country’s largest cities.
Since Hamas led a terrorist attack on southern Israel on October 7, Hamas and other armed groups have fired some 12,000 rockets from Gaza into Israel, a quarter of them on October 7, the Israeli government has reported. saying.
Most of the rockets fired from Gaza were shot down by Israeli air defenses before they could impact. But the ongoing salvos, although less frequent than at the start of the war, are an indication of the size of Hamas’s arsenal and its continued ability to threaten cities far from Gaza.
In nearly three months of war, 15 people in Israel have been killed in attacks and about 700 more have been wounded, according to Israel’s emergency service.
In southern Israel, along the border with Gaza, rocket attacks have long been a reality. But since the start of the war, Israelis across the country have become accustomed to the sound of air raid sirens.
In recent weeks, sirens have sounded in cities in central Israel, including Tel Aviv. Jerusalem residents were sent rushing to safe rooms and shelters in December for the first time in more than a month.
“It’s really sad to see mothers with babies running to shelters,” said Hannah Reback, 24, who was in Tel Aviv last week when the sirens went off.
The death toll from the rockets in Israel is far lower than the toll from Israel’s military campaign in Gaza, where more than 20,000 people have been killed, according to Gaza health officials. In November, the Israeli military said it had attacked 15,000 “targets” in Gaza, but did not specify the means by which they were attacked.
Israeli officials have said the rocket attacks show that Hamas and its allies in Gaza continue to terrorize Israeli civilians.
“If we do not decrease Hamas’ rocket-fire capacity, Hamas will continue to fire rockets at Israelis,” the Israeli military’s top spokesman, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, said Wednesday.
Many of the approximately 3,000 rockets Hamas fired during the first hours of its October 7 attacks were intercepted by Israel’s Iron Dome air defense system, but they still sent Israelis at a music festival to bunkers on the edge. from the road, where the militants massacred them. They were among about 1,200 people killed in Israel during Hamas-led attacks.
The Israeli military has spent much of the war in Gaza attacking Hamas’s striking capabilities. Many rocket launches early in the war came from northern Gaza, where the Israelis say they now have operational control. In recent weeks, the frequency of bombings from Gaza has decreased, according to Zohar Palti, a defense expert and former intelligence director for Mossad, the Israeli spy service.
The military recently posted video which it says shows rockets and launching infrastructure that soldiers found in Gaza near a mosque, in a compound used for youth activities, in playgrounds and near children’s pools. Israel has accused Hamas of using civilian centers such as hospitals and overcrowded neighborhoods as cover for its military operations.
In a telephone interview on Wednesday, Zaher Jabareen, a member of Hamas’s political leadership, dismissed accusations that Hamas fighters use civilian areas to hide and fire rockets as “lies and slander” by Israel.
Israel began using its Iron Dome defense system to intercept short-range rockets in 2011. The system has significantly reduced deaths from rocket attacks, but shrapnel from interceptions can be deadly and the system does not intercept all rockets.
Hamas’s arsenal consists mainly of locally manufactured short-range rockets, which are smaller and less accurate than the missiles and large bombs used by the Israeli military and other militaries.
Between 10 and 20 percent of Hamas rockets fail and fall in Gaza, Human Rights Watch said in a recent report, citing Israeli military data. Sometimes those rulings fall in Gaza and kill Palestinians.
In Ashkelon, one of the most targeted areas of Israel, the Barzilai hospital has been hit twice by rocket fire since October 7. The child development institute and the gynecology department were damaged, along with a bridge connecting separate wings of the hospital, officials said. . The facilities had been largely evacuated when the war began and no one was injured.
“Over the last 20 years, we’ve had one round of war after another,” said Dr. Ron Lobel, director of emergency and disaster medicine at the hospital, adding, “This round was very exceptional.”
Ben Hubbard contributed reporting from Istanbul, Johnatan Reiss from Tel Aviv and Myra Noveck of Jerusalem.
