Israel says it conducted 865 air raids in Gaza in 2018

By Abdel Raouf Arnaout

JERUSALEM

The Israeli army on Monday announced it had carried out a total of 865 airstrikes in the blockaded Gaza Strip over the course of 2018.

According to a report released Monday by the military, the Israeli army also destroyed 15 cross-border tunnels in Gaza within the same period.

The report did not mention the number of Palestinian casualties caused by the raids and tunnel demolitions.

According to the same report, Palestinian resistance factions based in Gaza fired some 1,000 rockets into Israeli territory, 250 of which were intercepted and 45 of which fell in residential areas inside Israel.

Attacks carried out by Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and the blockaded Gaza Strip left 16 Israelis dead (seven security personnel and nine settlers) and 199 injured, the report claimed.

The same report alleged that 20 Israelis had been killed in 2017 -- and another 169 injured -- in attacks by Palestinians.

The report did not provide any information about Israeli airstrikes carried out inside Syrian territory.

But according to the Israeli Broadcasting Authority, the Israeli military conducted a total of 180 air raids against Iranian and Hezbollah-linked targets in Syria over the course of 2018.