By Xinhua
Gaza : Three Palestinian civilians were killed and five wounded on Wednesday in an Israeli airstrike on a car that drove in the eastern part of Gaza City, paramedics and eyewitnesses said.
The witnesses said that an air-to-ground missile that was fired from an Israeli aircraft, missed a car that drove in a Gaza main street, adding that a huge explosion was heard, where ambulance and rescue teams arrived at the scene.
The Islamic Jihad (Holy War) movement said in a statement that Israeli aircrafts missed targeting a car full of three militants, members of the group, adding that the rocket hit bystanders, killed three civilians and wounded five more.
Mo’aweia Hassanein, chief of ambulance service in the Ministry of Health said that two brothers and one of their children were killed and five other civilians wounded. All were taken to Shiffa Hospital in Gaza City.
Earlier on Wednesday, the military wing of Hamas launched 21 home-made rockets on Israeli targets outside the Gaza Strip in response to an Israeli offensive in Gaza which left at least 17 dead.
In successive statements sent to the press, Hamas claimed responsibility on the rocket salvos which mostly targeted Sderot town, one kilometer to the northeast of Gaza Strip, and several settlements in the same range.
According to Hamas’ Ezz el-Deen al-Qassam Brigades, 65 rockets and 75 mortar shells were fired from Gaza Strip since Tuesday. “Our shelling against the Israeli settlement is a message to the enemy that we can create the same level of fear,” one of the statements said.
A final statistic from the Palestinian Health Ministry revealed that 17 Palestinians, including 13 Hamas fighters, were killed and25 wounded in an Israeli army offensive in eastern Gaza City on Tuesday. Three children and a woman were among the wounded people.
Meanwhile, four Palestinians were hurt in two Israeli strikes in northern Gaza Strip on Wednesday morning.
According to Mou’awia Hassanein, an artillery shelling moderately wounded two people in Beit Hanoun and an air strike on a car in Jabaliya also moderately wounded two.