Israel warns Gaza over kites as strikes kill Palestinians

Israel warned it would intensify action in Gaza after paper kites were found in southern Israel, a move Hamas rejected as a pretext for continued attacks and Palestinian officials said coincided with deadly Israeli strikes in central Gaza.

Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz said Monday that “forceful actions will be taken to put an end to this phenomenon,” referring to the launching of kites, balloons and drones from Gaza. He said Israel would show “zero tolerance,” adding: “A balloon is treated like a kite, and a kite is treated like a drone, with or without explosives.”

Four kites were found Friday and Saturday in Kibbutz Nahal Oz, about 800 meters from the Gaza border, and several more were found elsewhere in southern Israel last week, according to Israeli local media cited by the BBC. The Israeli military said no suspicious materials were attached to the kites and that they did not pose a threat. Al Jazeera reported that military inspections found 10 paper kites, all without explosives and flown by children in displacement camps.

Before the war, kites and balloons carrying incendiary devices were launched into Israel, causing fires that burned forest and farmland. Residents of Nahal Oz said in a statement that they feared a return of such attacks. “We will not accept a policy of containment when it comes to our security,” they said.

Hamas denied responsibility for the latest kites, saying they belonged to “children searching for their innocent childhood amid the rubble.” The group accused Israel of relying on “fabricated pretexts” to justify “the continuation of the aggression and violations against our people.” It also warned of “the danger of the allegations and threats” from Israel, describing the kites as “basically children’s toys from displacement camps.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Katz issued a joint statement Sunday threatening severe retaliation over “kites, drones and balloons,” Al Jazeera reported. The statement also threatened the forced displacement of Palestinians from areas “used as launch sites for kites, drones and balloons.” “There will be no return to the state of affairs prior to October 7 [2023],” the statement said, adding that Israel would not allow Hamas or any other group in Gaza “to threaten our communities again and compromise our citizens’ sense of security.”

The dispute came as Palestinian health officials reported new casualties from Israeli strikes. On Sunday, officials said two people were killed and seven injured in strikes in Nuseirat refugee camp and al-Zuwayda in central Gaza, the BBC reported. Al Jazeera reported that three Palestinians were killed in central Gaza on Sunday, including four-year-old Muhammad Abdel Salam Taha, after Israel struck a warehouse in az-Zawayda and areas near Salah al-Din Street. The BBC, citing local media, identified the boy as Mohammed Taha and said he was killed when a building in al-Zawayda was bombed.

The Israeli military said it killed Ismail Abu Ful, whom it identified as the commander of a Hamas weapons manufacturing site in the Maghazi area, and said residents had been warned to evacuate beforehand. “There is no ceasefire, there is nothing,” Abu Ahmed, a displaced man sheltering nearby, told Reuters. “We want solutions, we want to live in peace.”

On Monday, Palestinian media reported that Mohammed Abu Asad was killed in an overnight Israeli strike on a tent in Deir al-Balah. The Israeli military said Abu Asad was a member of the elite Nukhba forces of Hamas’s military wing who took part in the Hamas-led Oct. 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel.

Palestinian political analyst Hussam Shaheen told Al Jazeera that Israeli claims about drones launched from Gaza were “false and baseless,” while Israeli affairs expert Adel Shadid said the kite issue may have been manufactured as a pretext. Suleiman Bisharat, a political researcher, told Al Jazeera that Israel ties such incidents to its security equation to build domestic support for force.

Israel launched its military campaign in Gaza after the Oct. 7 attack, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 were taken hostage. More than 74,420 people have been killed in Israeli attacks in Gaza since then, including 1,288 since the ceasefire took effect, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry.