Meryem Göktaş
22 September 2018•Update: 22 September 2018
By Mohamed Majed
GAZA CITY, Palestine
An Israeli warplane on Saturday struck the northern Gaza Strip but apparently caused no casualties.
According to eyewitnesses who spoke to Anadolu Agency, the warplane targeted the Abu Safiyya district.
The Israeli army said in a statement that a military warplane had targeted young people in the Gaza Strip allegedly "flying incendiary kites and balloons."
No casualties or injuries were so far reported by Gaza’s Health Ministry.
In recent weeks, Palestinian activists have been flying burning kites and balloons over Israeli territory as part of ongoing anti-occupation protests along the Gaza-Israel buffer zone.
According to Israeli officials, the improvised aerial weapons have caused a number of fires inside Israeli settlements, causing significant material damage but not resulting in any deaths or injuries.
Since the latest round of Palestinian rallies began in late March, scores of Palestinians have been martyred -- and thousands injured -- by Israeli troops deployed along the other side of the buffer zone.
Protesters demand the “right of return” to their homes and villages in historical Palestine from which they were driven in 1948 to make way for the new state of Israel.
They also demand an end to Israel’s 11-year blockade of the Gaza Strip, which has gutted the coastal enclave’s economy and deprived its more than 2 million inhabitants of many basic commodities.
