By Mohammad Majid
GAZA CITY, Palestine (AA) – Palestinian resistance groups said in separate statements on Friday that their fighters are engaged in fierce clashes with Israeli forces in different areas of the Gaza Strip.
The Al-Qassam Brigades of Hamas said its fighters are fighting Israeli forces at point-blank range in the Shejaiya neighborhood of eastern Gaza City, claiming to have killed and injured Israeli soldiers.
It added that the brigade fighters used locally-made Yasin 105 anti-tank shells to target two Israeli Merkava-4 tanks in Shejaiya and Rafah, both in the southern Gaza Strip.
The Al-Quds Brigades of the Islamic Jihad group said its fighters booby-trapped a house in Shejaiya and detonated it when an Israeli force entered.
On Thursday, the Israeli army launched a ground offensive in the Shejaiya neighborhood, claiming to dismantle the Hamas group's military infrastructure.
The Israeli operation forced thousands of civilians to flee their homes in Shejaiya under heavy Israeli army shelling, resulting in casualties.
Flouting a UN Security Council resolution demanding an immediate cease-fire, Israel has faced international condemnation amid its continued brutal offensive on Gaza since an Oct. 7, 2023 attack by Hamas.
Over 37,700 Palestinians have since been killed in Gaza, most of them women and children, and more than 86,500 others injured, according to local health authorities.
Over eight months into the Israeli war, vast tracts of Gaza lie in ruins amid a crippling blockade of food, clean water and medicine.
Israel stands accused of genocide at the International Court of Justice, whose latest ruling ordered Tel Aviv to immediately halt its operation in Rafah, where over a million Palestinians had sought refuge from the war before it was invaded on May 6.
*Writing by Ahmed Asmar