By Ali Karbalaei

Palestinian resistance strikes Tel Aviv 

December 22, 2023 - 23:9
"740 Israeli military vehicles destroyed" since the regime began the ground offensive in Gaza 

TEHRAN - 77 days after Israel’s slaughter of innocent women and children in the Gaza Strip and amid Israeli propaganda that Hamas and other Gaza-based militant groups may have run out of rockets, Tel Aviv witnessed one of the most powerful missile salvos to date. 

The Palestinian resistance, however, did not limit their rocket and missile attacks to Tel Aviv but targeted multiple Israeli-occupied cities and settlements, taking the Israeli regime and its media outlets by complete surprise. 

The regime's Iron Dome missile system has been filmed trying to intercept rockets and long-range missiles from the coastal enclave. 

The footage that has gone viral on social media and Western news outlets shows a rocket barrage from the Gaza Strip at central Israeli-occupied territories. 

While Palestinian rockets and missiles have been fired from Gaza on an almost daily basis, Thursday was by far one of the largest attacks so far. 

Hamas's armed wing, the al-Qassam Brigades, claimed responsibility for a missile barrage from Gaza into the regime, saying it targeted Tel Aviv specifically.  

"Al-Qassam Brigades bombarded Tel Aviv with a missile barrage in response to the Zionist massacres against civilians," a statement read. 

While the statement only mentions Tel Aviv, other towns and cities have been hit by rocket fire according to widespread reports and the Israeli military itself. 

Photos published by Western media also show rocket barrages have been launched from Gaza at towns and cities across Israel. 

These include Tel Aviv, in central occupied Palestinian territories, Ashdod to the north, and Ashkelon to the south. 

At one point, the Israeli military was very busy updating its warnings to settlers on its Telegram channel at quite a rapid speed. 

At 08:17, it warned, "Sirens sounded in the communities near the Gaza Strip". 

At 09:37, it warned "sirens sounded in Kibbutz Nir Oz," a settlement near the Gaza Strip. 

At 09:57, it warned, "Sirens sounded in the communities near the Gaza Strip". 

At 10:14, it warned, "Sirens sounded in northern Israel". 

At 10:58, it warned, "Sirens sounded in northern Israel". 

At 11:18, it warned "sirens sounded in Kibbutz Nahal Oz" another settlement near the Gaza Strip. 

At 11:27, it warned, "Sirens sounded in Ashkelon". 

At 11:27, again it warned, "Sirens sounded in Ashkelon". 

At 11:27 once more it warned, "sirens sounded in Ashkelon". 

That's three barrages of rockets fired towards Ashkelon in the space of one minute. 

At 11:30, it warned, "Sirens sounded in central Israel". 

The latest is believed to have been the first missile salvo of the day launched by the al-Qassam brigades towards Tel Aviv. 

Later in the afternoon, Tel Aviv was under missile attack for the second time, according to reporters on the ground.  

Experts say the idea that the Israeli war on Gaza can crush Hamas's military ability will prove to be a pipe dream for the regime. 

"The Zionist regime can only cause death and destruction in the Gaza Strip and is starving the people of Gaza, this is all the Israeli enemy can achieve," Marwa Hassan, a Lebanese-based political analyst, told Tehran Times. 

Commenting on the missiles that targeted central occupied territories, the regime's media said, "We have not seen a large missile barrage like this for some time." 

Other regime media outlets have pointed out that this was one of the largest missile salvos since the start of the war that affected central cities. 

Israeli media also highlighted that the large number of rocket fires indicates that Hamas has the ability to continue launching the projectiles 77 days after the start of the war.
Touching on the capabilities of the Palestinian resistance, former Brigadier General Avigdor Kahalani told Israeli Channel 12 that the amount of weapons in Gaza "raises astonishment." 

It comes as Palestinian resistance factions continue to engage in fierce battles and clashes with the Israeli military inside the enclave. 

The Israeli military updated the number of its casualties, acknowledging that 40 troops had sustained injuries in 24 hours. 

The al-Qassam brigades and the al-Quds brigades (the armed wing of Palestinian Islamic Jihad) revealed that their forces were able to detonate an explosive ground device on yet another Merkava tank in the central Gaza Strip. 

Among the Israeli military vehicles being targeted, an increasing number of Israeli tanks are being completely or partially destroyed. 

This will be seen as quite an embarrassment for the Israeli regime. 

The Merkava tank is designed to carry four crew members. They include a driver, commander, gunner, and loader (for shells). 

On an almost daily basis, the Palestinian resistance says it has sniped crew members of Israeli tanks. 

If the driver is shot, this would render the tank unusable anymore. Who is going to drive it? You can't bring in a chauffeur to a battlefield. 

Among its latest updates, the al-Qassam Brigades said its fighters were able to snipe an Israeli soldier on the back of a tank in the central Gaza Strip before targeting it with a tandem missile. 

The driver's position is situated on the left side of the hull. So, on this occasion, it may not have been the driver who was shot, but the tendem missile would have damaged the tank to a certain extent. 

Both the armed wings of Hamas and Islamic Jihad revealed a number of ambushes and attacks against Israeli ground forces operating in the Gaza Strip, inflicting heavy losses on the invading army. 

In a fresh audio speech on Thursday, the official military spokesman for the al-Qassam Brigades, Abu Ubeida, revealed that the number of Israeli military vehicles that have been targeted since the start of the ground offensives in Gaza has reached 740. 

He also emphasized that the resistance continues to confront the occupation’s aggression. 

"What the occupation army is preoccupied with is the search for an image of victory and achievement," The spokesman said, stressing, "The lost and troubled enemy has not learned a single lesson from the experiences of history." 
Ubeida said the occupation regime is still repeating its follies and historical mistakes, attributing this to the fact that the regime is "separated from the reality of the Palestinian people and the ignorance of their civilization." 

The spokesman saluted those he described as "our nation’s fighters who confuse the enemy," especially the resistance from Yemen and Lebanon. 

Ubeida also touched on the occupation regime’s captives held by the resistance, saying, "If the enemy wants to capture them alive, it has no choice but to stop the aggression." 

Immediately after the speech, the al-Qassam brigades published a video entitled "Despite our keenness to preserve their lives... Netanyahu still insists on killing them," referring to the Israeli military shooting dead three of its captives in the Gaza Strip. 

The video starts with the titles:
"We tried to keep them alive"
"But Netanyahu insisted on killing them" 
The footage shows, for the first time, the three captives laughing and chatting together. They appeared healthy and in good spirits. 
The clip ends with "all three killed by the Israeli army".

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