Israel’s political leadership has reportedly instructed the army to prepare for a military offensive in the Gaza Strip, to be initiated if the launching of incendiary devices from the Hamas-run coastal enclave into Israeli territory continues.

According to a Channel 10 news report Tuesday, Israel has set Friday as a deadline for the flaming kite and balloon launches to cease. If this does not happen, Israel may decide it has no choice but to embark on a military campaign in the Strip, the report said.

Israel sent a similar message to Hamas through Egyptian intelligence, Channel 10 reported, with the Palestinian terror group in turn indicating its forces will work to stop the launching of burning materials by Friday.

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On Sunday, the IDF’s 162nd Armored Division launched an exercise simulating a war in the Gaza Strip, including the capture of Gaza City. While the military said it was planned in advance and was not related to the weekend’s exchange of fire, the manner in which the exercise was publicized by the military led many to see it as a tacit threat to Hamas.

Hamas is manning some 60 percent of its positions along the border fence in order to stop the launches, according to the TV report, and is expected to dispatch its forces to all of its posts by Friday.

Citing Palestinian sources, the report said Hamas would only put a complete stop to the flaming kite launches if it can achieve some sort of accomplishment, such as the reopening of the Rafah border crossing with Egypt. The Palestinian Liberation Organization’s ambassador to Egypt said earlier Tuesday the crossing would reopen on Wednesday after being shuttered for more than 24 hours over technical issues.

The report came as Israeli leaders touted the IDF’s readiness for a military conflict with Hamas amid ongoing violence along the Gaza border.

During a tour on Tuesday of the army’s Gaza Division, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel was already in a “military campaign.”

“We are in a military campaign in which there have been exchanges of blows. I am prepared to say that the Israel Defense Forces is prepared for any scenario,” Netanyahu said.

Over the weekend, Hamas fired some 200 rockets and mortar shells at Israel and the IDF carried out multiple strikes inside the Palestinian enclave. That escalation began after an IDF officer was moderately injured by a hand-grenade thrown by a Gaza assailant at the border on Friday.

On Saturday night, a ceasefire of sorts was brokered by Egypt and other international bodies, though Israel was not directly involved in the talks. The violence has abated, but tensions endured and cross-border attacks continued.

Asked if Israel was working to prevent a military conflict with Hamas, Netanyahu defended the government’s actions.

“I believe that we are doing the right things. It would be worthwhile to pay attention not only to what we are saying, but to what we are doing,” he said.

Netanyahu was joined on the visit by Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman, IDF Chief of Staff Gadi Eisenkot, and the head of the Shin Bet security service, Nadav Argaman.

While the senior officials were meeting in the Gaza Division on Tuesday, a number of incendiary and apparently booby-trapped balloons were launched into Israel from the Gaza Strip. A total of 17 fires started by airborne devices from Gaza were reported on Tuesday, including one that landed in the yard of a preschool where children were playing.

In response to the arson attacks, an Israeli drone conducted an airstrike near a group of Palestinians launching incendiary balloons from the northern Gaza Strip, injuring two of them, according to the Hamas-linked Shehab news outlet.

The Israeli military confirmed that one of its aircraft carried out the strike.

In recent days, the Israel Defense Forces has stepped up this practice, after the security cabinet called on it to take a more forceful stance against the airborne arson attacks on Sunday.

Recent months have seen daily arson attacks from Gaza with incendiary kites and balloons that have burned thousands of acres of Israeli land; regular riots and clashes along the border, which have resulted in over 130 Palestinians killed by IDF gunfire; and occasional outbursts of mortar and rocket fire by Gaza terrorist groups, which have prompted dozens of Israeli retaliatory airstrikes against Hamas positions. Dozens of the dead were members of Hamas and other terror groups, they have acknowledged.

This violence has raised tensions between Israel and Hamas to the highest they have been since the 2014 Gaza war.

In recent days, many officials and commentators in Israel, Gaza, and the international community have warned that another war in the Palestinian enclave was imminent in light of increased violence along the border, unless actions were taken to calm the situation.</s>Israeli leadership has reportedly instructed the country's military forces to prepare to invade the Gaza Strip if the flaming kite attacks don't cease by this week, according to a Channel 10 news report cited by The Times of Israel.According to the report, Israel has given Hamas until Friday to stop its flaming kite and balloon attacks;Israel sent the message directly to Hamas via Egyptian intelligence services, Channel 10 reported.On Sunday, the Israeli 162nd Armored Division launched a military exercise simulating an attack on the Gaza Strip and a capture of Gaza City. While the Israeli military claims the exercise had been planned in advance and was not related to current events, some saw it as an indirect threat to Hamas.On Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited the IDF's Gaza Division. During the visit, he said that the country is already in the midst of a "military campaign.""We are in a military campaign in which there have been exchanges of blows. I am prepared to say that the Israel Defense Forces is prepared for any scenario," Netanyahu said.During the last few months, Israel has suffered numerous attacks by kites, balloons and other objects that act as flying incendiary bombs. Thousands of acres of land are reported to have been burned by these attacks. In addition, Israel reports numerous sporadic clashes with Palestinians and mortar and rocket fire at Israeli territory. The Times of Israel has noted that</s>Israeli leadership has reportedly instructed the country's military forces to prepare to invade the Gaza Strip if the flaming kite attacks don't cease by this week, according to a Channel 10 news report cited by The Times of Israel.

According to the report, Israel has given Hamas until Friday to stop its flaming kite and balloon attacks; if Hamas fails to comply with the demand, Israel might decide it has no choice but to start a large-scale military operation.

On Sunday, the Israeli 162nd Armored Division launched a military exercise simulating an attack on the Gaza Strip and a capture of Gaza City. While the Israeli military claims the exercise had been planned in advance and was not related to current events, some saw it as an indirect threat to Hamas.

On Tuesday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited the IDF's Gaza Division. During the visit, he said that the country is already in the midst of a "military campaign."

"We are in a military campaign in which there have been exchanges of blows. I am prepared to say that the Israel Defense Forces is prepared for any scenario," Netanyahu said.

The report comes right as the Israeli Parliament, the Knesset, has stripped the country's prime minister and defense minister of the ability to declare war. The new legislation adopted Tuesday delegates this power to the Security Cabinet — a body of several officials, including the ministers of foreign relations and finance.

During the last few months, Israel has suffered numerous attacks by kites, balloons and other objects that act as flying incendiary bombs. Thousands of acres of land are reported to have been burned by these attacks. In addition, Israel reports numerous sporadic clashes with Palestinians and mortar and rocket fire at Israeli territory. The Times of Israel has noted that the level of tension between Israel and the Gaza Strip has reached an apex not seen since the 2014 Gaza war.</s>The Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, which controls the Gaza strip, on Tuesday announced it would gradually halt the launch of incendiary kites and balloons towards Israel, a Gazan Palestinian security source told EFE.

According to the source, Hamas agreed to terminate the launch of Palestinian incendiary floating objects from Gaza over the barbed wire fence separating the Palestinian coastal strip from the Israeli state.</s>Gaza, July 18 (IANS) Palestinian Islamist group Hamas, which controls the Gaza strip, has announced it will gradually halt the launch of incendiary kites and balloons towards Israel, the media reported.

The kites, some of which Israel says are also booby-trapped with explosives, have wreaked havoc in the Israeli communities surrounding the Gaza Strip since the phenomenon began in April, sparking fires that have scorched thousands of acres and caused vast damage.

Hamas made the announcement on Tuesday, according to Efe news. Reports said that the group leadership decided to take action against the flaming kites “to prevent dragging Gaza into a war”.

An agreement was reached after talks between Egypt and the UN Special Coordinator (UNSCO) for the Middle East Peace Process, Nickolay Mladenov, as he mediates with the Palestinians.

According to the UNSCO website, the Bulgarian diplomat appealed to the Palestinians to pull back from “the brink of a confrontation” and to “give peace a chance”.

Multiple parties including Egypt also told Hamas that the kites must be stopped “to prevent giving Israel an excuse to launch a major military offensive”.

Hamas has now deployed its security members along the Israeli-Gazan border to deter the launch of further incendiary objects.

The launch of incendiary flying objects began on March 30 coinciding with the Palestinian Great March of Return on its Gazan border with Israel, under Israeli blockade since 2007.

Palestinian kites and balloons have caused over 700 fires on Israeli soil and damaged Israeli farmlands.

Last weekend tensions in Gaza rose after the launch of 200 rockets, the biggest escalation since 2014, followed by Israeli forces reprisal operations and bombings targeting Hamas military objectives in Gaza, which killed two Palestinian minors.

The Israeli Defence Ministry has tightened its Gaza fishing waters restrictions from six to three nautical miles and maintains the closure of the Kerem Shalom border crossing, the only passage authorized for freight trucks carrying goods from Israel or Egypt to the Gaza Strip.</s>Look, I get it. Hamas executing gays is such a downer. And Hamas terrorizing Israeli children is not exactly breaking news. But if you fail to be moved by the Palestinians and the Israelis tortured and killed by this monstrous terrorist organization, maybe you’ll care for the animals?

Earlier this week, an employee of Israel’s National Parks Authority rushed to Habesor National Park, not far from the border with Gaza, to put out a fire caused by an incendiary airborne device. Hamas has launched many such attacks over the last few months, mostly by launching fiery kites that consumed 2,260 acres of land, or just about three Central Parks. But the latest attack, the employee soon learned, wasn’t caused by a kite: On a nearby tree, the man discovered the remains of a falcon, dispatched by Hamas to serve as an avian suicide bomber. The bird, a common kestrel, was discovered hanging from a tree with a harness attached to a steel wire connected to flammable material.

The Israel Defense Forces’ Coordinator of Government Activities in the Territories (COGAT) posted a photo of the bird’s remains to Twitter:

How to respond to such barbarism? One way is to donate to the Israeli Wildlife Hospital, which works to treat wounded and sick undomesticated animals. Another is to never forget that evil men will stop at nothing to inflict pain on others, and that, for the benefit of all living things, they must be forcefully stopped.</s>The Israel Defense Forces on Monday held a large-scale military drill simulating a ground incursion into the Gaza Strip.

The drill in the country’s Negev region, which involved infantry and armored corps, included exercises in urban warfare, with the city of Beersheba serving as a surrogate for Gaza’s cities, Channel 10 news reported. The drill began Sunday and will continue on Tuesday, and exercises include the simulated capture of Gaza City, officials said.

The exercise came after a weekend flareup between Israel and the Hamas terror group in the Strip, in which some 200 rockets and mortar shells were fired at Israel and the IDF carried out multiple strikes inside the Palestinian enclave.

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On Saturday night, a ceasefire of sorts was brokered by Egypt and other international bodies, though Israel was not directly involved in the talks. The violence abated to some degree, but tensions endured and cross-border attacks continued.

On Monday, the Security Cabinet was briefed on the Home Front Command’s preparedness for conflict, while the army deployed additional Iron Dome Missile Defense systems in central Israel, and called up some reserve forces to better handle security needs.

Monday’s exercise — which the IDF invited local media to film, and which was detailed on the evening’s main news broadcasts — appeared intended to send a message to Hamas that Israel was prepared to take drastic action, if needed, to bring peace back to the communities in the Gaza periphery, which have also endured weeks of “fire kite” attacks launched from the Hamas-run Gaza Strip. At the same time, the military said the drill was planned in advance and not in the wake of the weekend’s exchange of fire.

The IDF’s Gaza Division recruited reserve drivers Monday to help Israel’s fire department and the army deal with blazes in southern Israel caused by the airborne arson attacks.

Also Monday, the military completed deployment of another Iron Dome Missile Defense system in central Israel. The deployment came as part of the army’s preparations for the possibility that Hamas will instruct its operatives to fire long-range rockets at the heart of Israel.

Taking part in the drill, Ohad Najameh, commander of the 401st Armored Brigade, said he believed penetrating deep into Gaza would not take long, but that a decisive victory over Hamas would take some time.

“In order to win, we need to confront the enemy, and we want to confront them on our terms, in our time,” Najameh told Hadashot TV news. “We’ve developed the tools and the exercises so that we will be the stronger side when we meet Hamas.”

Najameh further stated that the IDF was prepared to strike Hamas leadership, and had detailed plans regarding the group’s top officials. “I believe that striking senior officials will deal a significant blow and will affect the battlefield,” he said. “And yes, we will try to strike them.”

“We are ready and speaking in terms of war [that could come] toworrow,” Lt. Col. Barak Rubin, deputy commander of the Nahal infanty brigade, told Channel 10. “It occurs to me that this drill could become a real entry into the Strip.”

He added: “The purpose is decisive action, that when I meet the enemy, I will be able to defeat him and destroy him. We’re preparing surprises on our side, tools the other side is unaware of.”

Lt. Col. Eli Gino, deputy commander of the Givati infanty brigade, added that the commanders and the military as a whole had implemented lessons from the 2014 war in the Strip. “We’ve learned and we’ve improved,” he said.

Over the course of approximately 24 hours Saturday, southern Israel and the Gaza Strip saw one of the largest exchanges of fire since the 2014 Gaza war.

On Friday evening, an IDF soldier was moderately wounded when a Palestinian threw a grenade at him during a riot along the Gaza security fence. In response, shortly after midnight on Friday, the Israeli Air Force conducted airstrikes against Hamas positions in the coastal enclave.

Hamas, which rules Gaza, along with the Iran-backed Palestinian Islamic Jihad and other terrorist groups in the Strip, launched a barrage of mortar shells and rockets at southern Israel.

The attacks from Gaza and Israeli retaliatory strikes continued from 1:30 a.m. on Saturday until shortly after 2 a.m. on Sunday, according to the IDF. In Sderot, three people were moderately injured when a rocket hit a home on Saturday. Hamas’s health ministry said two were killed and over 20 injured in Gaza.

A cessation of hostilities was agreed upon Saturday night, though Israeli officials refused to formally acknowledge it. A senior Israeli defense official would not directly comment on the reported ceasefire, and said: “Facts on the ground will determine our continued response.”

Incendiary kites and balloons continued to be flown into Israel on Sunday and Monday, and Israel has struck in the enclave in response.

Hamas has said it does not see these weapons, which have plagued Israel and sparked numerous fires, as illegitimate or a breach of the agreement. As such, the Gaza-ruling terror group maintains that Israeli strikes in response to these airborne arson attacks amount to violations of the ceasefire.

On Monday members of Israel’s Security Cabinet along with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu toured the IDF’s Home Front Command headquarters and discussed preparations for emergency situations and earthquake scenarios in civilian areas — another growing concern. Netanyahu also visited the rocket-battered Gaza border town of Sderot.

During the tour, the Security Cabinet announced its intention to formulate a 10-year plan that will see NIS 5 billion ($1.38 billion) spent on fortification of infrastructure on the home front, against attacks and earthquakes.

The national initiative will be planned by a joint team headed by the National Security Council, the Defense Ministry, the Finance Ministry, and other government ministries, the Prime Minister’s Office said in a statement.</s>Smoke raises in the background following an Israeli airstrike hits a governmental building in Gaza City , Saturday, July 14, 2018. The Israeli military carried out its largest daytime airstrike campaign in Gaza since the 2014 war as Hamas militants fired dozens of rockets into Israel, threatening to spark a wider conflagration after weeks of tensions along the volatile border. No casualties or major damage was reported on either side, and Israel said it was focused on hitting military targets and was warning Gaza civilians to keep their distance from certain sites.(AP Photo/Khalil Hamra)

JERUSALEM (AP) — The Israeli military carried out its largest airstrike campaign in Gaza since the 2014 war Saturday as Hamas militants fired dozens of rockets into Israel throughout the day, threatening to trigger an all-out war after weeks of growing tensions along the volatile border.

Two Palestinian teenagers were killed in an airstrike in Gaza City, while three Israelis were wounded from a rocket that landed on a residential home.

Israel said it was focused on hitting militant targets and was warning Gaza civilians to keep their distance from certain sites. But even before the report of casualties the intense tit-for-tat airstrikes and rocket barrages still marked a significant flare-up after a long period of a generally low-level, simmering conflict.

"The Israeli army delivered its most painful strike against Hamas since the 2014 war and we will increase the strength of our attacks as much as necessary," Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said.

Late Saturday, Hamas and Islamic Jihad militants in Gaza announced that they had agreed to a cease-fire brokered by Egypt, but sirens warning of incoming rockets still wailed in southern Israel early Sunday and it was unclear if the cease-fire was holding.

Lt. Col. Jonathan Conricus said the latest Israeli sortie, the third of the day, struck some 40 Hamas targets including tunnels, logistical centers and a Hamas battalion headquarters. He said the escalation was the result of the sustained Hamas rocket attacks, its fomenting of violence along the border and its campaign of launching incendiary kites and balloons that have devastated Israeli farmlands and nature reserves.

"Our message to Hamas is that we can and will enhance the intensity of our effort if needed," he said. "What Hamas is doing is pushing them ever closer to the edge of the abyss ... Hamas will have to understand that there is a price to be paid."

Later, witnesses reported that Israeli warplanes dropped four bombs on an unfinished building near a Hamas police and security compound in Gaza City, reducing the old structure to rubble. The four-story building is adjacent to a public park. Gaza's Health ministry said two teenagers were killed in the strike and ten others injured.

It marked the first casualties of the day. Striking in the heart of Gaza City is typically only seen during full-blown conflicts like the 2014 war and could signal that a further escalation may be in store.

The Israeli military had no immediate reaction to that strike but said it had targeted a separate high-rise building in the northern Gaza Strip that was used as a Hamas urban warfare training facility. It said a tunnel was dug under the building.

Shortly after, Israeli medical officials said three Israelis were wounded from a rocket that landed on a house in southern Israel. It said paramedics in the southern city of Sderot were treating a 52-year-old man with a chest wound, a 17-year-old girl with a face wound and a 20-year-old woman with injuries to her limbs.

Sirens wailed overnight and throughout most of the day Saturday in southern Israel as waves of rockets and mortars were launched from Gaza amid the airstrikes. The military said it identified about 60 launches of rockets and mortars from Gaza toward Israeli territory, of which about 10 were intercepted by the Iron Dome aerial defense system. As a precaution, the military shut down a popular beach in southern Israel and placed limitations on gatherings of large crowds. Israeli police says four of the projectiles caused damage.

Israel has been warning Hamas in recent weeks that while it has no interest in engaging in the kind of conflict that led to the sides fighting three wars over the past decade, it will not tolerate Gaza militants' continued efforts to breach the border and its campaign to devastate Israeli border communities with incendiary attacks.

With Israel focused on rising tension along its northern border in its efforts to prevent Iran from establishing a permanent military foothold in post-civil war Syria, it has been wary of escalating hostilities in Gaza. But Netanyahu has also come under pressure to act from southern Israeli communities, who have once again found themselves under rocket fire from Gaza in addition to contending with the daily field fires.

"We are ready to operate simultaneously in different theaters," Conricus said, referring to the dual threats from Syria and Gaza. "It will be challenging to fight on more than one border but it is something we can do and are prepared to do." Israel's military chief visited the border area for briefings and the Security Cabinet, Israel's top decision-making body, is expected to convene Sunday to discuss further actions. On Friday, thousands of Palestinians gathered near the Gaza border for their near-weekly protest. A 15-year-old Palestinian who tried to climb over the fence into Israel was shot dead. Later the military said an Israeli officer was moderately wounded by a grenade thrown at him. Gaza's health ministry said Saturday that a 20-year-old struck by gunfire Friday during the protests in the southern Gaza Strip had also died of his wounds. The Islamic militant group Hamas that rules Gaza has led border protests aimed in part at drawing attention to the Israeli-Egyptian blockade imposed after Hamas took control of Gaza in 2007. The demonstrations have been fueled in large part by pervasive despair caused by the blockade, which has caused widespread economic hardship. Over 130, mostly unarmed, Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire since protests began on March 30. Israel says it is defending its sovereign border and accuses Hamas of using the protests as cover for attempts to breach the border fence and attack civilians and soldiers. Most recently, it has been struggling to cope with the widespread fires caused by the incendiary kites and balloons floating over the border. In a statement, the military said Hamas' activities "violate Israeli sovereignty, endanger Israeli civilians and sabotage Israel's humanitarian efforts that aim to help Gazan civilians." In a relatively rare admission, Hamas said it fired the rockets to deter Israel from further action. Most of the recent rockets from Gaza have been fired by smaller factions but Hamas spokesman Fawzi Barhoum said it was an "immediate response" that was meant to "deliver the message." The military said its jets targeted two Hamas tunnels as well as other military compounds, including those involved in the production of the kites and balloons. It said the Hamas battalion headquarters in northern Gaza was completely destroyed and footage it released showed a series of large explosions that left a gaping hole in the ground.</s>Dear Reader, As you can imagine, more people are reading The Jerusalem Post than ever before. Nevertheless, traditional business models are no longer sustainable and high-quality publications, like ours, are being forced to look for new ways to keep going. Unlike many other news organizations, we have not put up a paywall. We want to keep our journalism open and accessible and be able to keep providing you with news and analyses from the frontlines of Israel, the Middle East and the Jewish World.

The Israeli military and Hamas have been in a stand-off for months, as the so-called "March of Return" protests along the Gaza Strip border morphed into ongoing incidents of kite arson which, in turn, has led to the familiar pattern of tit-for-tat exchanges of Palestinian rocket fire and retaliatory strikes by the Israeli air force. The unending tension heralded by frequent air raid sirens and palpable frustration at the seeming inability to stem the violence has the civilian population and its army demanding that its vastly stronger fighting force eliminate what it defines as a terrorist organization and what Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman calls a bunch of “cannibals.”



If the Israeli government decided to overthrow Hamas a power vacuum would necessarily emerge and it is uncertain which group would move in to fill it, according to security analysts who spoke to The Media Line. In such an eventuality, the fear is that an even greater foe or threat could fill the void. Moreover, according to this line of thought, if the Israel Defense Forces eliminated Hamas, Israel would lose an effective way of policing the Gaza Strip. Additionally, when organizations in the enclave attack Israel, the IDF holds Hamas accountable, a policy that forces Gaza's rulers to rein in those actors.





Nevertheless, following Sunday's strikes by the IDF of some 40 Hamas targets in Gaza, the question naturally arises: why does the government not immediately green-light the destruction of such terror infrastructure if it is aware of its existence?“[It is] better for Hamas to have a command structure,” Dr. Eran Lerman, a faculty member at Shalem College and Vice President of the Jerusalem Institute for Strategic Studies, told The Media Line. A retired IDF colonel, he contends that without this formal apparatus Israeli deterrence would be reduced as Hamas would have little to lose. Furthermore, without assets, it is possible that the terror group would quickly disintegrate or be overtaken by a competing entity that might be more anathema to Israel.According to Dr. Lerman, Israel's reticence to cross the fine line between a "proportional response" and complete invasion is compounded by a lack of desire to re-occupy Gaza, which would be a huge political and economic burden and undoubtedly generate a major diplomatic backlash.Professor Gabriel Ben-Dor from the University of Haifa explained to The Media Line that the government prefers to expend these resources on combating Iran, whose potential nuclearization is considered an existential threat. Also, he stressed, two organizations that could possibly be empowered by Hamas' downfall are Islamic Jihad and the Popular Resistance Committees, both of which have closer ties to Tehran. Lastly, any major confrontation between Israel and Hamas would break Israel's focus on curbing the Islamic Republic's regional expansionism, particularly in Syria.Security specialists who spoke to The Media Line almost uniformly agree that escalations like those over the weekend, when some 200 mortars were fired from Gaza into southern Israel, are driven by Hamas' desire to test Israel's limits.“If Hamas is stupid enough to go into the lion’s den,” Dr. Lerman affirmed, then Israel may move to a stronger military response. However, he qualified, the apparent ceasefire that was reached demonstrates that Hamas is unwilling to press pass a certain point.Nearly every observer believes that neither Israel nor Hamas is presently interested in a full-blown conflict, but they disagree on the IDF's ability to maintain the current status quo.Dr. Danny Tirza, a retired IDF colonel and Fellow at the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, contended to The Media Line that war is inevitable. As regards the potential elimination of Hamas, he expounded, “we don’t have to be afraid of doing it.”On the flip side, Prof. Ben-Dor argues that the best chance for a long-term solution is to improve the humanitarian conditions in Gaza while pressing for Hamas' demilitarization. This, coupled with an elusive Israeli-Palestinian peace process could, in time, lead to a breakthrough.</s>JERUSALEM >> The Israeli military lifted its restrictions along the Gaza border Sunday, indicating it had accepted an Egypt-mediated cease-fire that ended a 24-hour round of fighting with Hamas militants that had threatened to devolve into all-out war.

The military had shut down a popular beach and placed limitations on large gatherings as residents kept mostly close to home on Saturday amid dozens of rockets that were fired from Gaza. But after several hours of calm it said residents could resume their daily routines.

On Saturday, the military carried out its largest wave of airstrikes in Gaza since the 2014 war, hitting several Hamas military compounds and flattening a number of its training camps. Two Palestinian teenagers were killed in an airstrike in Gaza City, while four Israelis were wounded from a rocket that landed on a residential home.

The military said several mortar shells were fired even after Hamas announced the cease-fire as sirens warning of incoming projectiles wailed in Israel overnight again. The military struck the mortar launcher early Sunday but the calm held, with neither side appearing eager to resume hostilities.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel would not accept a cease-fire unless it included an end to all militant hostilities, including incendiary kites and balloons from Gaza that have devastated nearby Israeli farmlands and nature reserves.

“The Israeli military has delivered its most punishing blow against Hamas since the 2014 war. I hope they got the message. If not, they will get it later on,” he said at the weekly cabinet meeting.

After several balloons drifted into Israel Sunday, the military said it targeted the Hamas squad that had launched them from the northern Gaza Strip.

Hamas police also announced an explosion Sunday at a house in Gaza City that killed a father and son, aged 35 and 13. The explosion appeared to be an accidental blast related to militant stock piles of explosives. Hamas said it would investigate.

Israel said it unleashed Saturday’s barrage in response to weeks of violence along Gaza’s border — including a grenade attack Friday that wounded an officer — as well as sustained Hamas rocket attacks and a campaign of incendiary devices floating over the border.

Hamas responded with more than 200 projectiles toward Israel communities, evoking memories of the three wars the sides have waged over the past decade. Israel said its Iron Dome defense system shot down more than 20 projectiles.

On Sunday evening the military announced that following a “situation assessment” it had reinforced Iron Dome batteries in central Israel and in the south of the country. It added that a small number of reserve army soldiers were called up.

Israel also destroyed several Hamas attack tunnels, as well as factories involved in the production of the incendiary kites and balloons, and a Hamas battalion headquarters in northern Gaza.

“We have no intention of tolerating rockets, kites, drones or anything,” said Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Lieberman. “I hope that Hamas will draw conclusions and if not, they will have to pay a heavy price.”

Two teenagers were killed and several others were wounded when Israel struck an unfinished five-story building near a Hamas security compound and a public park in Gaza City, reducing the structure to rubble. The military said Hamas was using it as a training facility and had dug a tunnel underneath as part of its underground network.

The rare strike in the heart of Gaza City blew out windows at a nearby mosque, an art gallery, government offices, a tech start-up company and dozens of houses, leaving light fixtures and wiring dangling. The Al-Azhar university said its classrooms and the dentistry college lab were also damaged.

Speaking to thousands attending the two teenagers’ funeral, Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh vowed to continue Gaza protests and to take revenge for the teens. He also met with the U.N. Mideast envoy, Nickolay Mladenov, who urged both sides to maintain calm

“Yesterday we were on the brink of war, and it has taken the concerted efforts of everyone to make sure that we step back from confrontation,” Mladenov said in Gaza. “Everybody needs to take a step back.”

The strike that killed the teenagers unleashed a Hamas’ launch toward the Israeli border town of Sderot, where a rocket hit the Buchris family home.

“We were sitting in the living room and all of a sudden, the aquarium exploded and there was smoke everywhere and glass flew everywhere,” said Aharon Buchris, who was wounded along with his wife and two teenage daughters, as he awaited surgery in hospital.

Israel has been warning Hamas that while it has no interest in exacerbating hostilities, it will not tolerate Gaza militants’ continued efforts to breach the border and its campaign of incendiary attacks on Israeli border communities.

Hamas-led border protests are aimed in part at drawing attention to the Israeli-Egyptian blockade imposed after Hamas took control of Gaza in 2007. Over 130 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli fire since protests began on March 30.

With Israel focused on efforts to prevent Iran from establishing a permanent military foothold in neighboring Syria, it has been wary of escalating violence in Gaza. Netanyahu has also come under pressure from southern Israeli communities under rocket fire from Gaza.

Hamas, meanwhile, has been trying to break out of its isolation and spotlight the hardships of the impoverished strip without invoking the full wrath of Israel.

Associated Press writer Fares Akram in Amman, Jordan, contributed to this report.
The Israel Defense Forces are instructed to prepare for a large-scale military offensive in Gaza if demands for Hamas to halt the launches of flaming kites, incendiary devices and rocket attacks are not met by Friday.