Palestinian militants in Gaza fired five rockets at Israel on Sunday despite reports that they had agreed to halt such attacks.
Early Monday, an Israeli aircraft fired missiles at a house of a Hamas activist, causing damage but no injuries.
Palestinian officials said Saturday that Hamas, Islamic Jihad and the Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades had reached an agreement to stop firing rockets if Israel calls off the Gaza offensive it launched last month after Hamas-linked militants captured a soldier and killed two others in a raid on an Israeli military post. The militant groups denied an agreement had been reached.
Under the reported deal, the rocket fire was supposed to end at midnight Saturday. But early Sunday morning, militants launched five homemade rockets into Israel, causing no injuries.
Abu Ahmad, an Islamic Jihad spokesman, said no agreement had been reached.
“As long as there is Zionist aggression, we will continue our resistance,” he said, adding that talks on an agreement had not ended yet.
Early Monday, an Israeli helicopter fired a missile at a two-story house at the entrance to the Shati refugee camp next to Gaza City, causing damage but no casualties, Palestinians said. The house belongs to a Hamas activist. The military said the target was a storage facility for rockets and weapons of Hamas and Islamic Jihad.
Minutes later, an Israeli tank shell exploded next to a small hospital in the northern Gaza town of Beit Lahiya, breaking windows, hospital officials said. No one was hurt.
Israel has been carrying out a campaign of airstrikes and raids into Gaza for nearly a month to pressure the militants to free the captured soldier and to stop firing rockets into Israel. More than 100 Palestinians have been killed, the majority of them gunmen.
