Seven Wounded as Rafah Terrorists Fire 10 Rockets, Mortar Shells

(JNS) – At least seven people were wounded in southern Israel, one seriously, on Sunday when terrorists fired a 10-rocket-and-mortar-shell barrage from the Rafah area of southern Gaza at Kibbutz Kerem Shalom.

Several rockets exploded near a military facility, causing the casualties, the Eshkol Regional Council said.

“The injured are not residents of the council and we pray for their recovery,” the council said.

Helicopters evacuated the wounded to hospitals. Their identities were not immediately known. One of those hurt was listed in very serious condition. Many military personnel were on the scene.

The Air Force subsequently attacked terrorist targets in Rafah, in the areas from which the missiles were fired towards Kerem Shalom.

The Kerem Shalom area, located at the Israel-Gaza-Egypt border triangle, is also the site of the primary crossing between Israel and Gaza, where thousands of humanitarian aid trucks have passed through during the war.

The Kerem Shalom crossing is currently closed to the passage of humanitarian aid trucks, the IDF said.

The attack comes as the military prepares for an offensive in the last Hamas bastion along the Egyptian border should the terrorist organization reject Jerusalem’s latest truce offer, described by U.S. mediators as the most generous yet from the Israeli side.

Jerusalem says going into Rafah is essential to winning the war, given that four of the final six Hamas battalions—thousands of gunmen—are entrenched there. If the Rafah operation does not move forward, Israel has warned that Hamas will regroup and threaten Israel again. The terrorist group has pledged many repeats of the atrocities committed on Oct. 7.

National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir tweeted following the attack: “We did not attack Gaza and we received the seventh of October, We didn’t attack in Rafah and we received a precise attack, Netanyahu, go into Rafah now!”