GAZA STRIP, Palestine
Israeli warplanes bombed Hamas tunnels and underground bunkers in the northern Gaza Strip, military officials said early Saturday, as part of an expanded ground and air assault to crush the enclave's ruling Hamas militants after its bloody incursion in southern Israel three weeks ago.
Israel Defense Forces said fighter jets struck dozens of underground targets and knocked out key communications infrastructure, causing a near-blackout of information and severing Gaza's estimated 2.3 million residents from contact with the outside world.
“We are advancing in the stages of war. Last night, IDF forces entered the Gaza Strip and expanded ground activity,” Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari said at an early Saturday news briefing.
“The forces still remain in the field and are continuing the war‚” said the IDF spokesman, signaling Israel’s sustained ground incursion had likely begun.
Israel had previously made only brief sorties into Gaza during weeks of intense bombardment.
Hagari also said Israel would allow trucks carrying food, water and medicine to enter Gaza on Saturday, indicating a possible pause in bombing, at least along its border with Egypt where small amounts of aid have been arriving.
"Overnight, IDF fighter jets struck Asem Abu Rakaba, the Head of Hamas' Aerial Array," IDF posted on X, formerly Twitter, indicating it may have killed the militant group's air chief.
"Abu Rakaba was responsible for Hamas' UAVs, drones, paragliders, aerial detection and defense," the post continued. "He took part in planning the October 7 massacre and commanded the terrorists who infiltrated Israel on paragliders and was responsible for the drone attacks on IDF posts."
IDF officials also said they downed a surface-to-air missile fired from inside Lebanon at an IDF drone. Spokesman Avichay Adraee wrote on X that the IDF was “attacking the source of the missile launch." Adraee said earlier that an Israeli jet struck a Hezbollah military structure, which had fired missiles toward Israel that landed in Syria.
Hamas on Saturday pledged to confront Israeli attacks with "full force" after Israel's military widened its air and ground attacks on the Palestinian enclave.
The al-Qassam brigades, an armed wing of Hamas, said early on Saturday its fighters were clashing with Israeli troops in Gaza's northeastern town of Beit Hanoun and in the central area of Al-Bureij.
"Al-Qassam Brigades and all Palestinian resistance forces are fully prepared to confront the aggression with full force and thwart the incursions," it said.
White House national security spokesman John Kirby on Friday said he had seen reports about Israel expanding its ground operations in Gaza but would not comment on it.
Israel had gathered 300,000 reservists and troops outside Gaza in preparation for the incursion against the militant group Hamas. Israeli airstrikes have been pummeling Gaza since Hamas' deadly October 7 attack on Israel killing some 1,400 people, including children, and taking more than 200 hostages.
The death toll in Gaza has reached more than 7,000 people, according to Gaza's Ministry of Health.
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