Israeli war planes struck targets in the Gaza Strip in the early hours of Friday, in response to two rockets fired at the Tel Aviv region on Thursday night.
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The Gaza strikes, which began a little after 1am, came shortly after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu convened senior security officials at the Defense Ministry compound in Tel Aviv.
Israeli sources said after the security meeting that, “decisions had been made.”
The Israeli media reported ahead of the Gaza air strikes that the IDF would deliver a significant response to the rocket fire.
“We have just started striking terror sites in Gaza,” the IDF posted on Twitter minutes after the air strikes began. “Details to follow.”
Not long after the IDF began its assault, air raid sirens sounded in some Israeli communities bordering the Gaza Strip.
Both Hamas and Islamic Jihad - the two Gaza terror groups responsible for previous rocket fire on Israel - denied carrying out the strikes.
According to some reports, Hamas was rounding up people it suspected had a role in the rocket fire.
Thursday’s rocket strikes were the first on the Tel Aviv area since the end of the 2014 war in Gaza. Netanyahu’s main rival in the April 9 elections, Benny Gantz, was head of the IDF at the time. Gantz called Thursday night for Israel “to act aggressively against violations of our sovereignty and against an attack on the security of the state of Israel.”