IAF destroys 2 Gaza rocket launchers

The Israel Air Force attacked two stationary Qassam rocket launchers near the Jabaliya refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip on Thursday.

According to the IDF, one of the launch pads was used to fire a rocket on the western Negev earlier Thursday, and the second launch pad was prepared for a launching.

During the early hours of Thursday morning Israeli warplanes and helicopters launched strikes against terror infrastructure in Gaza for the first time in six months, this following rocket fire on the western Negev region.

The raids targeted a weapons cache in the north Gaza town of Jabaliya and a metal workshop used to manufacture rockets and mortars in Khan Younis, located in the southern part of the Hamas-controlled enclave.

The strikes caused extensive material damage but no injuries, witnesses and medical sources said.

At least six Qassam rockets were fired from Gaza toward the Negev region since the morning hours, this just 24 hours before the official ending of the shaky ceasefire between Israel and the armed Palestinian groups in the Hamas-controlled territory. No injuries or damage were reported in the attacks.

On Wednesday more than 20 rockets were fired from Gaza into Israel. In one of the barrages a rocket hit a shopping mall, lightly injuring three people. Seven more suffered from shock.

Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni said at an Institute for National Security Studies conference in Tel Aviv on Thursday that "in the long run Israel cannot afford to have a Hamas-ruled terror state on its southern border. Right now the truce is not being upheld. Israel should have responded and should respond."