By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News
JERUSALEM (Worthy News) – As Israeli families grieved their loved ones on the first anniversary of the October 7 massacre, “they were forced to run for their lives in order to seek shelter from rockets” fired from Yemen, Lebanon, and Gaza, Israel’s military said Monday.
More than a dozen people were reportedly injured by rockets fired into Israel by Iran-backed Houthis, Hezbollah, and Hamas, designated as “terrorist organizations” by Israel and most of its allies.
The latest known attack on Monday involved one or more rockets believed to have been launched by the Yemen-based Houthis.
“Sirens [are] sounding all over central Israel as a result of a missile from Yemen,” the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) added. “This is the reason we keep fighting,” the IDF said in a statement monitored by Worthy News.
The sirens warning of an incoming missile came as hundreds of relatives of people killed or abducted in last year’s October attack gathered for a memorial service in a central Tel Aviv park.
The event was already scaled back because of threats of missile fire, and on Monday, those gathered were forced to lie face down on the ground until the Yemen rocket was intercepted, witnesses said.
Yemen’s Houthis claimed that they fired two missiles at Jaffa, a city in central Israel, and Israel later said it intercepted a missile aimed at the area from Yemen.
SIRENS SOUNDING
“Following the sirens that sounded in a number of areas in central Israel, the surface-to-surface missile fired from Yemen was successfully intercepted” by the Israeli Air Force, the military stressed in a statement.
It did not immediately say who was responsible.
The Houthis said one missile was a Palestine 2, and it “reached” its target. The group added that the second was a Dhu al-Fiqar missile but did not describe its outcome.
The Yemeni group said the operation
“successfully achieved its objectives,” and it targeted several drones at Jaffa and Eilat.
Israel only mentioned the intercepted surface-to-surface missile without referring to the drones or a second missile.
The Iran-backed Houthi movement, which controls northern Yemen, has frequently attacked Israel over the past year in what it says is solidarity with Palestinians in Gaza.
Israel announced earlier it is fighting for its existence against Iran’s proxies “at seven fronts,” including Gaza, the West Bank, also known as Judea and Samaria, Lebanon, Iran, Syria, and Yemen.
ROCKETS FIRED
That became clear earlier on Monday when rockets fired from Hamas targeted Tel Aviv and set off sirens in central areas of the country, officials said.
The five rockets reportedly lightly wounded two women and caused minor damage. Israel’s military said the missiles arrived from the area of Khan Younis in Gaza.
It came as Hamas’ ally Hezbollah in Lebanon fired rockets at Israel’s third-largest city, Haifa.
The group said it had targeted a military base south of the city with “Fadi 1” missiles and launched another strike on Tiberias, 64 kilometers (40 miles) away.
Ten people were reported injured in the Haifa area, and two others further south in central Israel.
The rocket fire came as Israeli forces prepared to expand ground raids into south Lebanon following three weeks of intense Israeli strikes and attacks in the country.
Israel’s military confirmed it carried out extensive bombings of Hezbollah targets in south Lebanon and that two Israeli soldiers were killed in border-area combat, taking the military death toll inside Lebanon so far to 11.
BEACH WARNINGS
The military also said people should not be on the beaches along the Mediterranean coast from the Israeli border all the way north of the southern Lebanese port city of Sidon.
IDF Arabic-language spokesperson Avichay Adraee warned residents of Lebanon to avoid the beaches as the IDF will take imminent action against Hezbollah.
“Hezbollah’s actions are forcing the IDF to take action against it. In the near future, the IDF will operate in the maritime sector against the Hezbollah terrorist organization,” Adraee said in comments seen by Worthy News.
“The IDF has no intention of harming you. For your safety, avoid staying at sea or on the beaches from now until further notice,” Adraee added on social media platform X.
“Staying on the beaches and the movement of vessels in the area south of Awali puts your lives at risk,” he added.
The military also warned people not to sail along an area up to 35.2 kilometers (22 miles) north of the Israeli border as it plans operations on Lebanon’s southern coast.
Despite the dangers of incoming missiles and drones, a memorial ceremony in Tel Aviv eventually continued on the first anniversary of the October 7 attacks.
SECOND MEMORIAL
A second major memorial was held by the government in Israel, although the ceremony was pre-recorded without an audience – apparently out of concern it could be disrupted.
The Hamas massacre on October 7 turned a “paradise into hell,” Israel’s President Isaac Herzog said in his speech at the prerecorded state ceremony. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu defended his government’s performance on October 7 and said they “would not give up on the hostages, soldier or civilian, nor on the return of residents to their homes in the North and the South.”
Ceremonies and protests were also held elsewhere in Israel, one year on from when Hamas crossed the Gaza border and rampaged through Israeli towns and kibbutz villages.
Some 1,200 people, including babies and women, were killed, and about 250 others were taken into Gaza as hostages, making it the worst atrocity against Jews since the Holocaust, also known as the Shoah.
Israel has responded by unleashing a large-scale offensive on Gaza that has killed almost 42,000 people, according to the Hamas-run health authorities in the territory.
Those death figures have been challenging to verify independently. Hamas-linked authorities do not differentiate between killed civilians and combatants.
Israel maintains at least 17,000 people among the fatalities are Hamas fighters.
It also says Hamas no longer exists as an organized military structure and has been reduced to guerrilla tactics, but on Monday, it became clear that force was still able to fire rockets at Israel.
About 350 Israeli soldiers have been killed in combat in Gaza since the October 7 attacks triggered the Israel-Hamas war.
Copyright 1999-2024 Worthy News. This article was originally published on Worthy News and was reproduced with permission.
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