First Israeli airstrikes since truce hit Gaza sites

GAZA CITY, Palestinian Territories－Israel carried out airstrikes on the Gaza Strip early on Wednesday after militants in the Palestinian territory sent incendiary balloons into the south of the country, in the first flareup between the two sides since a war in May killed hundreds of people.

The strikes were the first under Israel's new coalition government headed by Naftali Bennett, who took over on Sunday after ousting former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

They came as more than a thousand ultranationalist demonstrators bearing Israeli flags poured into Jerusalem's flashpoint Old City on Tuesday, with scores of police deployed and international monitors urging calm.

Palestinian sources said Israel's air force targeted at least one site east of Khan Yunis in the south of the Gaza Strip, which is home to some 2 million people.

The Israeli Defence Force said in response to the "arson balloons", its "fighter jets struck military compounds belonging to the Hamas terror organization".

There was no indication of casualties so far.

Local firefighters said the incendiary balloons caused around 20 fires in southern Israel.

The violence is the first flare-up between Israel and Palestinian militants since a cease-fire in May ended 11 days of heavy fighting that killed 260 Palestinians including some fighters, the Gaza authorities said.

In Israel, 13 people were killed, including a soldier, by rockets and missiles fired from Gaza, the police and army said.

A new poll released on Tuesday finds a dramatic surge in Palestinian support for the Islamist group of Hamas following last month's war, with around three quarters viewing the group as victors in the battle against Israel to defend Jerusalem and its holy sites. The scientific poll by the Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research also found plummeting support for President Mahmoud Abbas.

In annexed East Jerusalem, more than 1,000 people took to the streets in a delayed and controversial march by nationalist and far-right activists.

The United States and the United Nations had called for restraint before the march, which Bennett's new administration had authorized.

With tensions high, Israeli police officers were deployed in heavy numbers, blocking roads and firing stun grenades and foam-tipped bullets to remove Palestinians from the main route.

Medics said 33 Palestinians were wounded. Police said two officers were injured and 17 people arrested. The demonstration triggered protests in the West Bank and Gaza Strip and prompted rebukes and warnings from Israel's allies.

Controversial march

The so-called March of the Flags celebrates the anniversary of the city's "reunification" after Israel captured East Jerusalem from Jordan in 1967 and annexed it, a move not recognized by most of the international community.

Tuesday's demonstration was originally scheduled for early May but was canceled twice amid police opposition and threats from Hamas which controls the Palestinian enclave of Gaza.

Throngs of mostly young religious men sang, danced and waved flags at the Damascus Gate entrance to the Old City that was cleared of its usual Palestinian crowds.

The march came just two days after Netanyahu was ousted after 12 straight years in power, toppled by a loose coalition including, for the first time in Israel's history, an Arab party.

Bennett is himself a Jewish nationalist but Netanyahu's allies accused the new premier of treachery for allying with Arabs and the left. Some demonstrators on Tuesday carried signs reading "Bennett the liar".

Yair Lapid, the architect of the new government, tweeted that he believed the march had to be allowed but that "it's inconceivable how you can hold an Israeli flag and shout, 'Death to Arabs' at the same time".

Mansour Abbas, whose four-seat Raam Islamic party was vital to the coalition, called Tuesday's march a "provocation" that should have been canceled.

Agencies Via Xinhua