TEL AVIV — The deaths of four children in a rocket strike near a mosque in northern Gaza Saturday amid Israel’s Operation Breaking Dawn were caused by a Palestinian rocket and not an Israeli airstrike, video shows.
The children’s deaths were among seven in a residence in the Jabaliya refugee camp, and prompted immediate finger-pointing by Hamas and Palestinian media. But videos circulating widely on social media show that one of the many rockets fired by the Palestinian Islamic Jihad toward Israeli citizens misfired and detonated inside Gaza.
“Tonight, Islamic Jihad terrorists fired a rocket towards Israel which fell short inside Gaza, hitting a Palestinian home in the Jabalia neighborhood and tragically killing at least four children,” Keren Hajioff, spokesperson for Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid, said in a video statement. “There is video documenting the entire thing. There was no Israeli activity in the Gaza Strip, in that area or at that time.”
The Israeli military launched Operation Breaking Dawn on Friday to combat what Israeli commanders claimed was an immediate and genuine threat that the terror group posed to Israeli communities. The Israeli Air Force carried out multiple strikes in Gaza targeting the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror group. However, Israel Defense Forces (IDF) officials insisted there had been no air strikes in the area at the time when the children were killed.
The IDF also released a video that showed a rocket failing to cross into Israel and crashing into the Jabalia refugee camp. Officials said the clips “prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that this incident was not the result of an Israel Defense Forces’ strike. Israeli security forces did not strike in Jabaliya in the past few hours,” according to The Jewish Chronicle.
According to a detailed chronology from Israeli military officials, the blast in the refugee camp happened at around 9 pm in the northeastern part of Gaza. Israel had targeted only the northwestern part of the Strip at 6:51 pm.
Hajioff said the terrorist group must be held accountable for its actions.
“Islamic Jihad is killing Palestinian children in Gaza,” Hajioff said. “One in four rockets fired from Gaza towards Israel – lands inside the Gaza Strip. The world should be outraged at this terrorist group targeting innocent Israelis and killing innocent Gazans. Israel will continue to stand up to this vicious terrorist organization – which threatens Israelis and Palestinians alike.”
Palestinian Arabs chiefly pay the cost for radical Islamic terrorism https://t.co/b86jiRxLVy
— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) August 7, 2022
According to the IDF, some 200 of the 1,100 rockets that Palestinian Islamic Jihad has fired at Israel since the operation began have landed within Gaza. More innocent people in Gaza were killed by failed Islamic Jihad rockets than by Israeli airstrikes during Operation Breaking Dawn, according to Brig. Gen. Ran Kochav.
“All fire by the Islamic Jihad terrorist organization is a double war crime,” said Elad Tene, head of the Prime Minister’s Office’s Public Diplomacy Directorate. “All fire by the Islamic Jihad terrorist organization is a double war crime: it is shooting at civilians, and using Gazan civilians as human shields. This incident is an example of Islamic Jihad harming the residents of Gaza. All harm to innocent civilians is tragic.”
Palestinian Islamic Jihad rocket fire and IDF airstrikes continued throughout Saturday and Sunday until a ceasefire took effect Sunday night.