Israeli military says intercepted two rockets launched from Gaza

Jerusalem, Oct 17
Two rockets fired from the northern Gaza Strip were intercepted by Israeli air defence systems, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said.

Following the launches on Wednesday evening, sirens were sounded in the southern Israeli city of Sderot and nearby villages, reports Xinhua news agency.

Sirens were also activated later in the Upper Galilee region in northern Israel, with no casualties reported.

Earlier in the day, Israel's Magen David Adom rescue service reported that four people were slightly injured following the launch of 30 projectiles from Lebanon into the Upper Galilee.

Also on Wednesday, the Al-Quds Brigades, the armed wing of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement, claimed that it had bombed Sderot, Nir Am, and Israeli settlements near Gaza with a barrage of rockets.

Additionally, Israeli warplanes renewed on Wednesday their raids on Beirut's suburbs after days of cautious calm, launching three consecutive airstrikes on Haret Hreik.

The raids were preceded by an Israeli warning to evacuate several buildings in Haret Hreik in the Dahieh suburbs, Xinhua news agency reported, quoting the Lebanese National News Agency.

Israeli army spokesman claimed that the Israeli aircraft "raided weapons for Hezbollah stored underground in a warehouse in the southern suburb, with precise intelligence guidance from the Military Intelligence Service."

Beirut's southern suburbs have been spared from Israeli airstrikes in the past five days, while Lebanese caretaker Prime Minister Najib Mikati said on Tuesday that Lebanon had obtained "a kind of a guarantee" from the United States to reduce the Israeli escalation in Beirut and its southern suburbs.

Since September 23, the Israeli army has been launching an unprecedented, intensive air attack on Lebanon, dubbed "Arrows of the North," in a dangerous escalation with Hezbollah.

The death toll from Israeli airstrikes on Lebanon since the beginning of the Hezbollah-Israeli conflict on October 8, 2023, reached 2,350, while injuries went up to 10,906.