by Al Jazeera

At least 115 people have been killed in a bomb and gun attack on a mosque in Egypt’s northern Sinai Peninsula, according to state media.

The attack took place in the al-Rawda village, west of el-Arish, shortly after Friday prayers.

Egyptian state media MENA provided the death toll, citing an official security source. It also said that 80 people were wounded in the attack.

Local media reports said that attackers planted explosives and then opened fire on worshippers while the sermon was under way.

Egypt has for years been battling an armed movement in the rugged and thinly populated Sinai Peninsula, which has gained pace since the military overthrew democratically elected president Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood in mid-2013.

In 2014, following a suicide bombing that left 31 soldiers killed, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi declared a state of emergency in the peninsula, describing it as a “nesting ground for terrorism and terrorists”.

Local media also reported the closure of the Arish-Rafah road, further east.

The attack comes a day before the Rafah border crossing, the main gateway for Palestinians in the besieged Gaza Strip to the outside world, was due to open for a three-day period.

The border opened briefly earlier this week.

Saudi Arabia’s King Salman met with Saad al-Hariri in Riyadh on November 6 [Handout/Reuters]

by Al Jazeera

Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait have advised their citizens not to travel to Lebanon and urged those who are in the country to leave as soon as possible.

Saudi Arabia’s official news agency SPA quoted a source in the foreign ministry on Thursday as saying: “Due to the situations in the Republic of Lebanon, the official source at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs stated that the Saudi nationals visiting or residing in Lebanon are asked to leave the country as soon as possible.

“The Kingdom advised all citizens not to travel to Lebanon from any other international destinations.”

Only hours later, Kuwait and the UAE also urged its nationals to leave Lebanon immediately.

Bahrain – an ally of Saudi Arabia – had already ordered its citizens to leave Lebanon on Sunday, with the Bahraini foreign ministry issuing a travel advisory that cited “safety considerations”.

Leave of absence
Lebanon has been on edge after the sudden resignation of Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri, who announced his departure while on a visit to Saudi Arabia on Saturday.

His whereabouts have since been unknown. However, officials told Al Jazeera on Thursday that Hariri may be under house arrest or temporarily detained in the Saudi capital of Riyadh.

Lebanon’s Future Movement party, which is headed by Hariri, demanded on Thursday that the prime minister returns from the kingdom immediately in its sharpest statement yet over his leave of absence.

“The return of the Lebanese prime minister, the national leader, Saad al-Hariri, and the head of the Future Movement, is necessary to restore the dignity and respect to Lebanon at home and abroad,” said a former prime minister, Fouad Siniora, in a statement read on TV.

Al Jazeera’s correspondent in Lebanon said that the country’s President, Michel Aoun, would soon call for assistance from the international community, the Arab League, the United States, the United Kingdom, China and Russia – to help uncover the reason behind Hariri’s unexpected resignation.

Reuters news agency reported on Thursday, citing a senior Lebanese official, that the Lebanese government has not received Hariri’s official resignation papers, and as such still considers him as prime minister. The official added that the restrictions imposed by Saudi Arabia act as an “attack on Lebanon’s leaders”.

Riyadh has denied that the prime minister is under house arrest.

‘War declaration’
In his November 4 resignation, Hariri implicitly blamed Iran and its Lebanese ally, Hezbollah, for his decision. In his speech, he said that he suspected there were plans to target his life.

His father, Rafik Hariri – who also served as prime minister – was killed by in a bomb attack in 2005. Many of Hariri’s supporters blamed the bombing on Hezbollah, which denies it was involved.

In his address from Riyadh, Saad al-Hariri said Iran planted “disorder and destruction” in the country and meddled in the internal issues of Lebanon as well as other Arab countries.

Referring to Hezbollah, which is backed by Iran, Hariri said, “Iran’s arm … has managed to impose a fait accompli on Lebanon through the power of its weapons” in the last few decades.

“They have built a state within a state,” Hariri said from Riyadh.

His unexpected move also stoked fears of an escalation in the regional divide between Iran and the Gulf states, primarily Saudi Arabia, with Lebanon on the front lines.

Thamer al-Sabhan, the Saudi minister for Gulf affairs, said on Monday that Lebanon’s government would “be dealt with as a government declaring war on Saudi Arabia” because of what he described as “acts of aggression” committed by Hezbollah.

In an interview with Al Arabiya, Sabhan said Hezbollah was involved in every “terrorist act” that threatened Saudi Arabia.

“The Lebanese must choose between peace or aligning with Hezbollah,” he added, without offering details about what action Riyadh might take against Beirut.

Hariri, a leading Sunni politician, has been in office for less than a year, but previously served as prime minister between 2009 and 2011.

Mohammed bin Nayef was Saudi Arabia’s crown prince before his removal in June [File: Reuters]

by Al Jazeera

Mohammed bin Nayef, Saudi Arabia’s ex-crown prince who was removed as next in line to the throne in June, has reportedly become the latest royal family member to be targeted in the kingdom’s expanding anti-corruption crackdown.

According to Reuters news agency and the Wall Street Journal, bank accounts linked to Mohammed bin Nayef and some of his immediate relatives were frozen by Saudi authorities.

Both reports on Wednesday cited sources “familiar with the matter”. The Reuters report was also carried by Saudi state-owned media.

The freezing of Mohammed bin Nayef’s accounts came as Saudi authorities launched a new arrest campaign as part of the widening purge that began on Saturday, according to Reuters.

Dozens of royals, government officials and influential entrepreneurs have already been detained, facing a number of allegations, including money laundering and bribery.

Among those held are 11 princes, four ministers and several former ministers, in what is seen as an unprecedented crackdown that has shaken the kingdom.

Meanwhile, the number of domestic bank accounts frozen as a result of the purge is more than 1,700 and increasing, according to the reports.

High-profile detentions
The steps were the latest in a series of policies widely seen as an effort by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to assert power over the country and its political and business elite.

On Saturday, King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud announced that his son, the crown prince, would oversee a newly formed anti-graft commission that would purge the country of corruption.

Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, a billionaire businessman who owns investment firm, Kingdom Holding, was among those held. The list of detainees also included senior ministers who were recently sacked, such as Prince Mitaab bin Abdullah, the head of the National Guard, and Adel Faqih, the economy minister.

Mohammed bin Salman replaced his cousin, Mohammed bin Nayef, as the kingdom’s crown prince in June.

Mohammed bin Nayef made his first confirmed public appearance since his removal at the funeral on Tuesday for Prince Mansour bin Muqrin Al Saud, deputy governor of Asir province, according to Saudi media.

Mansour bin Muqrin died in a helicopter crash on Sunday. No cause has been given for the crash.

‘Rights concerns’
On Wednesday, US-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) said in a statement that the “mass arrests” carried out by Saudi Arabia raised human rights concerns.

“The middle-of-the-night simultaneous establishment of a new corruption body and mass arrests over corruption raise concerns that Saudi authorities detained people en masse and without outlining the basis of the detentions,” Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at HRW, said.

“While Saudi media are framing these measures as Mohammad bin Salman’s move against corruption, the mass arrests suggest this may be more about internal power politics,” she added.

The rights group noted that arbitrary detention is in contravention of international human rights law, and demanded those arrested be informed of the “specific grounds for their arrest” and ” be able to fairly contest their detention before an independent and impartial judge”.

“Saudi authorities have not disclosed the specific reasons for the detention of the dozens of other people since mid-September. But the detentions fit a pattern of human rights violations against peaceful advocates and dissidents, including harassment, intimidation, smear campaigns, travel bans, detention, and prosecution,” its statement added.

by Al Jazeera

At least 30 Yemenis, including women and children, were killed in a series of Saudi-led air strikes in north Yemen, activists and local media said.

Hussain al-Bukhaiti, a pro-Houthi activist, told Al Jazeera at least 16 air strikes targeted the village of Hiran in Hajjah province on Tuesday, killing 30 people, including a family of 10.

Quoting local residents, Bukhaiti said the raids started shortly after midnight, targeting the home of Sheikh Hamdi, a Houthi loyalist, killing him and his family.

The strikes reportedly continued until 5pm local time (14:00 GMT). According to Bukhaiti, the devastation prevented relatives and rescue workers from retrieving the bodies of the dead.

Al Masirah, a TV channel run by the Houthis – a group of rebels who control Hajjah province, the capital, Sanaa, as well as other parts of central Yemen – said 10 paramedics were also killed.

It published photos on Twitter and its website showing a bombed-out vehicle and dead children.

Al Jazeera could not independently verify the claims.

Yemen has been torn apart by conflict since 2014, when Houthi rebels, allied with troops loyal to former president Ali Abdullah Saleh, captured large expanses of the country, including Sanaa.

A coalition of Arab countries assembled by Saudi Arabia launched an air campaign against the rebels in March 2015, to try to restore the internationally recognised government of President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi to power.

Since then, more than 10,000 people have been killed, millions were forced from their homes, and the country has been facing severe famine and a deadly cholera outbreak.

by Al Jazeera

Saudi Arabia has dismissed a number of senior ministers and detained nearly a dozen princes in an investigation by a new anti-corruption committee, state media reported on Saturday.

Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, a billionaire businessman who owns the investment firm, Kingdom Holding, was among those held, according to Reuters news agency, citing an unnamed senior official.

The senior ministers who were sacked include Prince Mitaab bin Abdullah, the head of the National Guard, and Adel Faqih, the economy minister.

Abdullah al-Sultan, commander of the Saudi navy, was replaced by Fahad al-Ghafli.

In a statement on the official Saudi news agency, SPA, King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud alluded to the “exploitation by some of the weak souls who have put their own interests above the public interest, in order to illicitly accrue money” for the creation of the anti-graft committee.

Anti-corruption probe
Saudi-owned Al Arabiya news channel reported that at least 11 princes, four current ministers and several former ministers had been detained in the anti-corruption probe.

Saudi authorities have not confirmed the names of those detained. However, 14 former and current ministers, officials and businessmen were mentioned on social media as being among those held.

One of those mentioned is Waleed al-Ibrahim, chairman of the Middle East Broadcasting Center (MBC), under which Al Arabiya operates.

According to Al Arabiya, the new committee, which is headed by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, is looking into the 2009 floods that devastated parts of Jeddah, as well as the government’s response to the Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) virus outbreak.

King Salman issued a statement saying that the committee shall “identify offences, crimes and persons and entities involved in cases of public corruption”.

The committee has the power to issue arrest warrants, travel bans, disclose and freeze accounts and portfolios, track funds and assets, and “prevent their remittance or transfer by persons and entities, whatever they might be”, according to the statement.

‘Accelerated change’
The shake-up of the Saudi government comes just months after King Salman replaced his nephew Mohammed bin Nayef with his son Mohammed bin Salman as the kingdom’s crown prince.

Mohammed bin Salman has been responsible for pushing through a number of changes both at home and abroad since he became first in line to the Saudi crown.

Ian Black of the London School of Economics said the move fit a “pattern of accelerated change” since Mohammed bin Salman became heir to the throne.

“We’ve seen since June this year, very far-reaching changes,” he said, adding: “That was when Mohammed bin Salman, the son of King Salman, was appointed crown prince.

“Since Mohammed bin Salman became the crown prince in June, we’ve seen a lot of upheaval. We’ve seen the announcement of this very ambitious Saudi plan to transform the country, the Saudi economy, Vision 2030.”

The dismissal of Mitaab bin Abdullah as National Guard minister came shortly after a missile attack by Yemen’s Houthi rebels on Riyadh’s King Khaled International Airport.

However, Black said the two were probably not related as the sacking came bundled with changes to other ministerial portfolios.

In recent weeks, Saudi Arabia announced an end to its long-standing ban on allowing women to drive, and Mohammed bin Salman has also promised to return the country to a “moderate” form of Islam.

Since 2015 Saudi Arabia has been at war against Houthi rebels, who control much of northern Yemen on the kingdom’s southern border.

What does this mean? Al Jazeera’s senior political analyst Marwan Bishara explains:

“There have been signs over the last two and a half years that more of this is coming. [Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman] is raising the leverage of power in Saudi Arabia. He certainly has the blessings of his father, King Salman, and he’s determined to make all kinds of changes in Saudi Arabia itself and in Saudi foreign policy, which led to the war in Yemen and the Gulf crisis.

But internally this is new. Not only do we have a new chapter opening up in Saudi Arabia, we have a whole new book, a whole new political alphabet with one exception: It’s still all done in secrecy. Why those 11 princes, why those four standing ministers? Is it really just to consolidate power or is there more to it?

Why isn’t there more transparency and sharing of evidence about the setting up of the committee? We really are on the brink of dramatic changes.

In 2015, Mohammed bin Salman became minister of defence. Just a few months ago, he became the head of all the internal security forces because they got rid of Mohammed bin Nayef, then crown prince. Now he’s taken control of the third most important security apparatus within the country, so he has defence, he is in control of interior, and now he is in control of the guards.

Clearly, he has the stage set. Clearly all the heads of all the major media networks, newspapers, and commentators were all already groomed, set in motion in order to defend the crown prince and his policies. There are already new songs for the crown prince and his glory, so internally they are definitely setting the stage in terms of the three security apparatuses, the media and so on.

President Trump has given his blessings and support to the crown prince with the hundreds of billions of dollars of promised contracts, so he’s certainly supporting his various ambitions in the region, most importantly that of the confrontation with Iran in the region. This is something that Trump really wants as well as apparently a promised rapprochement with Israel.

In the tradition of Saudi Arabia, revolting against the royals is not a good idea. It’s never been recommended. But does it all end with this or will it lead to more? I think it will lead to more, but will it then lead to discontent among Saudis? It just might.”

Yemen’s capital was struck by overnight air raids that continued well into the next day, targeting the defence ministry and a popular public square [Mohammed Huwais/AFP]

by Al Jazeera

The Saudi-led coalition bombing Yemen carried out at least 29 air strikes on Sanaa province, hours after Houthi rebels fired a ballistic missile towards the Saudi capital Riyadh.

Residents told Al Jazeera that bombs “rained down” on several neighbourhoods of the capital on Sunday, targeting a stage in al-Sabeen square used by Houthi rebels for military parades, the nearby presidential palace, the national security headquarters and the interior ministry.

The Houthi-run Saba news agency reported more than 15 air strikes in Sanaa and a further 14 in the districts of Sinhan and Bani Bahloul.

Fatik al-Rodaini‏, an activist based in the capital, told Al Jazeera some of the raids targeted Sanaa’s old city, a UNESCO world heritage site.

“This is the worst day I’ve experienced since the start of the war,” Rodaini said.

“I am fearing for my children’s lives. They haven’t gone outside all day. Just a few minutes ago I was thinking of letting them run to the shops but we heard another loud explosion and my wife said ‘no’.

“The Saudis don’t care about our children, our future, our lives. They know that civilians live in close proximity to government buildings yet they continue to target those areas – they just don’t care.”

Hours earlier, the Saudi military confirmed intercepting a ballistic missile that was fired from Yemeni territory towards the kingdom.

‘Riyadh sleeps peacefully’
Colonel Turki al-Maliki said Saudi forces intercepted the ballistic missile with a surface-to-air Patriot missile, which caused it to shatter into fragments in an “uninhabited area” east of Riyadh’s King Khalid International Airport.

The Houthis – a group of rebels who control Saada province, the capital Sanaa, as well as other parts of central Yemen – claimed responsibility for the attack, vowing to target the capitals of all Arab countries that are bombing the country.

“Riyadh slept in peace and comfort and last night due to the efforts of the Saudi armed forces,” al-Maliki said.

“We will continue to target the Houthis and their missiles that are sponsored by the Iranians,” he added.

In an interview with Al Jazeera earlier this month, Mohammed Abdul Salam, a spokesman for the Houthi rebels, threatened to escalate operations on the Yemeni-Saudi border and target deep inside the kingdom.

“The Saudis started the war. Our response will continue and increase, whether it’s targeting deep inside Saudi Arabia, targeting military positions where Saudi jets fly from, or military bases inside Yemeni territory,” Abdul Salam said.

“Abu Dhabi and others that target Yemen are – as far as we’re concerned – a fair military target. Any country that targets Yemen will be struck by our missiles.”

Yemen, which sits on the southern edge of the Arabian Peninsula, has been engulfed in war since September 2014, when Houthi fighters swept into the capital and overthrew President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi’s internationally recognised government.

Concerned by the rise of the Houthis, believed to be backed by regional rival Iran, Saudi Arabia and a coalition of Sunni Arab states launched an intervention in 2015 in the form of a massive air campaign aimed at reinstalling Hadi’s government.

Since then, the Houthis have been dislodged from most of the south, but remain in control of Sanaa and much of the north.

Signatures of Palestinian school students were presented to the British consulate in East Jerusalem [Reuters]

by Al Jazeera

People in various parts of the world have staged protests on the centenary of Britain’s Balfour Declaration, which promised a homeland for the Jewish people and paved the way for the occupation of Palestine.

Thousands gathered in Ramallah, administrative capital of the occupied Palestinian territories, on Thursday to march to the British cultural centre, according to official Palestinian media.

A statement from the office of President Mahmoud Abbas called for an apology from Britain, recognition of Palestine and compensation for the Palestinian people in political, moral and material terms.

WATCH: Israeli PM Netanyahu visits UK to mark Balfour centenary (02:08)
“Here in Ramallah, for Palestinians, this declaration is seen very much as the moment a hundred years of disposition, displacement and occupation began,” Al Jazeera’s Harry Fawcett, reporting from Ramallah, said.

Dozens of others gathered in a separate protest outside the British consulate in occupied East Jerusalem.

A hundred thousand signatures and hundreds of letters from Palestinian high school students were presented to the British consulate in occupied East Jerusalem, according to Sawsan Safadi, an official from the Palestinian Ministry of Education.

The letters expressed the students’ feelings about the legacy of the declaration.

Khadija Khalaf, a 17-year-old Palestinian high school student from East Jerusalem, was among the protesters who carried the letters.

“We came here holding signatures of 100,000 students from the schools of Palestine protesting against the Balfour promise,” Khalaf told Al Jazeera.

“After 100 years, we the Palestinians have not taken our rights. We hope that they hear our voices as children.”

Protesters shouted slogans such as “Down with the Brits” and “Justice, power, freedom: Our state is Palestinian”.

“In addition to admitting its mistake, it must assume responsibility for the damage that befell the Palestinians as a result of the Balfour Declaration and the policies that ensued,” Zakaria Odeh, a 64-year-old protester, told Al Jazeera.

Protest in Pretoria
In Pretoria, South Africa, hundreds gathered outside the Israeli embassy in a protest against the Israeli occupation of Palestine, organised by the Economic Freedom Fighters party (EFF).

Protesters, dressed in the characteristic red T-shirts of the EFF, held placards with slogans calling for an end to “Israeli ethnic cleansing of Palestinians” and a halt to attacks on the Gaza Strip, as they danced and sang outside the heavily guarded embassy.

“Away with apartheid Israel, away,” the crowd shouted.

Julius Malema, leader of the EFF, urged the crowd to look beyond their own context and to consider the plight of the Palestinians.

He also called for a one-state solution where Jews and Palestinians could live in peace.

Malema made an impassioned appeal to South Africans to stop working with Israel, even asking South Africans to stop travelling to the country in solidarity with Palestine.

“We asking all South Africans to stop doing business with Israel, to stop visiting Israel. We are returning the favour to the people of Palestine who stood with us,” Malema said to loud cheers.

“We call for the release of Marwan Barghouti, who is in sitting in Israeli jail, in quite the same way that Nelson Mandela was in jail for all those years,” Zaakirah Vadi, communications officer for the Ahmed Kathrada Foundation, an anti-apartheid organisation, told the crowd.

Roads around the embassy were closed off, and police had closed the entrance to the building.

Many South Africans see the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territories and the policies applied there as similar to apartheid, the institutionalised racial segregation and discrimination implemented by the white minority in their country until 1991.

In Ankara, the Turkish capital, dozens of members of the Anatolian Youth Association, a conservative organisation, marked the Balfour Declaration centenary with slogans and placards.

At Sakarya University in northwest Turkey, the Humanitarian Relief Foundation, an aid group, led protesters in a rally.

Azad Essa and Ibrahim Husseini contributed to this report

Palestinian policemen loyal to Hamas stand guard as fuel tankers enter Gaza through Rafah border in June 2017 [File: Reuters]

by Linah Alsaafin, Al Jazeera

Hamas has handed over administrative control of five border crossings in Gaza to the Palestinian Authority.

Wednesday’s handover, the first in over a decade, is part of a deal agreed on in the latest round of Egypt-brokered reconciliation talks between Hamas and the PA-ruled Fatah political party in Cairo on October 12.

Fatah spokesperson Osama Qawasmeh told Al Jazeera that no conditions were set by Fatah or Hamas for the handover.

“The issue is simply a matter of restoring the status quo back under the Palestinian Authority’s control, as was the case before the 2007 split,” he said, referring to the political schism that ended with Hamas taking over the Gaza Strip after an attempted coup by US-backed Fatah strongman Mohammad Dahlan.

The PA will take administrative charge of the three cargo crossings including the Karam Abu Salem crossing on the Egyptian border, as well as the Rafah and Beit Hanoun (Erez) crossings – the latter which is controlled by Israel in the north of the Strip.

In a statement on Tuesday, the PA minister of civil affairs, Hussein al-Sheikh, said the national unity government is prepared to work closely with Egyptian authorities to prepare the Rafah border crossing for operation by November 15, as specified by the 2005 Agreement on Movement and Access.

Rafah, the main border crossing in the south of the Gaza Strip, has been largely closed to Gaza’s population of two million since Hamas took over.

The other crossing, Erez, is located in the north of the strip and is run by Israel.

The PA will also be in charge of the three cargo crossing points of Karni, Kerem Shalom (Karem Abu Salem) and Sufa.

‘Better quality of life’
Qawasmeh said that this handover would make the lives of Palestinians in Gaza “much easier”.

“This will no doubt help enable a huge part of people’s lives to travel outside the Gaza Strip for whatever reason such as seeking medical treatment, undertaking a scholarship in a university, and leisurely travel,” he said.

“The movement of products will be facilitated quicker and will make it easier for import and export trade,” he added.

Hazem Qassem, a Hamas spokesperson, echoed his counterpart.

“We hope that handing over control would lead to a better quality of life for Palestinians in the Gaza Strip,” he told Al Jazeera.

He stressed that handing over control was not a security issue, but rather a logistical one.

Governing the ‘mega-prison’
However, Alaa Tartir, the programme director of the Palestinian policy network Al-Shabaka, said that the transfer of administrative border control “does not necessarily translate into a meaningful national reconciliation and unity”.

“Assuming that the mere replacement of personnel at the borders and crossings will lift the siege on Gaza is a naive and dangerous assumption,” Tartir said.

“It is a test to examine the fragility or durability of the recent reconciliation agreement.”

“It is crucial to acknowledge that Israel, as an occupying power, will remain the de facto holder of power over borders and crossings,” he continued.

“This will only change when the Israeli occupation ends. The Hamas-Fatah infighting about who will ‘manage’ the borders and crossings is merely a fight about who will ‘govern’ the mega-prison.”

Since Hamas took over in 2007, Israel has imposed an air, naval and land blockade on the Gaza Strip, a stretch of land measuring 51km in length and 11km in width. Earlier this year, the PA added pressure on Hamas’ government by requesting Israel to cut off its electricity supply to Gaza.

A matter of protocol
Qawasmeh said that the closure of the border crossings was due to the absence of a “legitimate government” and that things are finally “going back to normal”.

He also said that the actual transfer of border control would not have much pomp and fanfare.

“The process of handing over control is just a matter of protocol,” Qawasmeh said. “The real case is the decision of Hamas – which up until now has been positive – to completely transfer all powers to the national unity government as was stipulated in the latest reconciliation agreement.”

The next round of reconciliation talks will take place in Cairo on November 21, where Qassem and Qawasmeh said the discussion would focus on logistics of administration and security of the Gaza Strip.

-Additional reporting by Farah Najjar

A Palestinian woman reacts at a hospital after her relative was killed near the border between Israel and central Gaza Strip [Mohammed Salem/Reuters]

by Al Jazeera

Palestinian armed groups have vowed to respond to Israel’s attack on a tunnel in a southern town of the Gaza Strip late on Monday that left at least seven people dead and nine others wounded.

“We will exercise our right to respond – this is our duty,” Daoud Shehab, a leader in the Islamic Jihad movement, told Al Jazeera, adding that it is the legitimate right of the resistance groups to respond.

Palestinian media said that the tunnel in Khan Younis had been hit by the Israeli air force.

“Reports said Israel fired five missiles at the tunnel that was being dug east of Khan Younis and which Israel claims was leading to its territory,” Palestinian news agency Wafa said.

Israeli officials said that the tunnel near the border wall, which was in the process of being built, was blown up after being monitored for some time.

The ministry of health in Gaza officially identified five of those killed as members of the al-Quds Brigades, the military wing of the Islamic Jihad and two others as members of Hamas’ Izz Eddine al-Qassam Brigades.

Hamas decried the attack as the “latest Zionist crime”.

“Resisting the occupation in all its forms is a natural right guaranteed for our people,” the movement said in a statement.

Meanwhile, Fatah, the West Bank-based political party of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, called for dialogue between Palestinians to discuss the best response to the Israeli bombardment.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hailed what he called “breakthrough technology” in dealing with tunnel threats.

He also held Hamas responsible for any attempt to harm the sovereignty of his country.

Since 2008, Israel has launched three offensives on the Gaza Strip.

The latest one took place in the summer of 2014 and resulted in the deaths of more than 2,200 Palestinians, including 500 children.

Sixty-six Israeli occupation soldiers and seven Israeli non-combatants were killed in the same period.

The Israeli blockade of the occupied Gaza Strip, in its current form, has been in place since June 2007.

Israel controls Gaza’s airspace and territorial waters, as well as two of the three border crossing points; the third is controlled by Egypt.