“Over the last week, explosive balloons are being launched from the Gaza Strip into Israeli territory,” the Israeli Defense Force (IDF) said in a statement early Thursday, according to AFP.

“In response, a short while ago, IDF fighter jets and tanks struck a number of Hamas military targets in the Gaza Strip.”

The Zionist regime’s army said the strikes were aimed at a military compound and observation posts used by Hamas, who it claimed also fired a volley of rockets into the sea this week after repeated exchanges of fire.

A Gaza security source said Israeli warplanes had carried out several strikes, causing severe damage to the sites and some damage to citizens’ homes.

The Gaza Strip has been under an Israeli blockade since June 2007. It has caused a decline in the standard of living as well as unprecedented levels of unemployment and unrelenting poverty.

Israel has launched three major wars against the enclave, killing thousands of Gazans each time and shattering the impoverished territory’s already poor infrastructure, but Tel Aviv failed to reach its objectives in all of the three wars.