Israel has struck Gaza after accusing Hamas of violating the ceasefire

Israel has launched airstrikes in Gaza in response to what Israeli officials say are violations of a US-brokered ceasefire agreement.

Defense Minister Israel Katz accused Hamas of attacking Israeli soldiers in Gaza on Tuesday and violating conditions for returning the bodies of deceased hostages.

The Palestinian militant group said it had “no connection” to the attack and insisted it was committed to the ceasefire agreement.

First responders in Gaza said at least nine Palestinians were killed in a wave of Israeli strikes in the territory on Tuesday evening.

Despite the outbreak, US Vice President JD Vance said he believed the truce was holding.

A brief statement released by Prime Minister Netanyahu’s office on Tuesday evening said he had ordered “forceful strikes” against the military, but did not specify why.

However, Defense Minister Katz said Hamas had crossed a “bright red line” by launching an attack on Israeli soldiers in Gaza on Tuesday.

“Hamas will pay many times over for the attack on the soldiers and the violation of the agreement to return the fallen hostages,” he warned.

An Israeli military official said the attack took place “east of the Yellow Line,” which demarcates Israeli-controlled territory in Gaza under the cease-fire agreement.

Israeli media reported that troops in the southern Gaza city of Rafah came under anti-tank rocket and sniper fire on Tuesday afternoon, while Palestinian media reported Israeli artillery shelling in the area at the same time.

After the Israeli military carried out airstrikes in Gaza on Tuesday evening, witnesses reported powerful explosions in several parts of the territory, including Gaza City in the north and Khan Younis in the south.

A spokesman for the Hamas-run Civil Defense Agency told the BBC that at least four people were killed, including three women, when a home belonging to the Al-Banna family was bombed in the southern Sabra neighborhood of Gaza City.

The strikes also reportedly hit the courtyard of al-Shifa hospital in the western Rimal district.

The civil defense spokesman said five other people were killed, including two children and a woman, when a vehicle was hit on Al-Qassam Street in Khan Younis.

Hamas issued a statement denying its fighters had attacked Israeli troops and condemning the Israeli strikes.

“Hamas confirms that it has no connection to the shooting in Rafah and reaffirms its commitment to the ceasefire agreement,” the statement said.

“The criminal bombing carried out by the fascist occupation (Israeli) army in areas of the Gaza Strip is a gross violation of the ceasefire agreement.

Meanwhile, the group’s military wing said it would delay returning the body of a hostage it had recovered on Tuesday because of what it called Israeli “violations”.

US Vice President Vance told reporters in Washington: “The ceasefire is holding. That doesn’t mean there won’t be little skirmishes here and there.”

“We know that Hamas or someone else in Gaza has attacked an (Israeli) soldier. We expect the Israelis to respond, but I think the president’s peace will hold regardless,” he added.

Israel’s prime minister earlier vowed to take unspecified “steps” against Hamas after the group handed over a coffin containing human remains on Monday night that did not belong to one of the 13 dead hostages still in Gaza.

Netanyahu’s office said forensic tests showed they belonged to Ofir Zarfati, an Israeli hostage whose body was found by Israeli forces in Gaza in late 2023, and that it constituted a “clear violation” of the ceasefire agreement.

The Israeli military also released drone footage it said showed Hamas operatives “removing body remains from a structure that had been prepared in advance and burying them nearby” in eastern Gaza City on Monday.

“Shortly after,” he added, the operatives “called in representatives of the Red Cross and staged a mock demonstration of the discovery of the body of a deceased hostage.”

Hamas rejected what it called “baseless accusations” and accused Israel of “seeking to fabricate false pretexts in preparation for taking new aggressive steps.”

In a statement later, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) condemned what it called the “false recovery”, saying it attended the crime scene “at the request of Hamas” and “in good faith”.

He continued: “The ICRC team at the site were not aware that a deceased person had been placed there prior to their arrival as seen in the footage – generally our role as a neutral mediator does not include exhuming the bodies of the deceased.

“Our team only observed what appeared to be the retrieval of remains without prior knowledge of the circumstances leading up to it.

“It is unacceptable to stage a false recovery when so much depends on the fulfillment of this agreement and when so many families are still anxiously awaiting news of their loved ones.”

The cease-fire agreement brokered by the US, Egypt, Qatar and Turkey is supposed to fulfill the first stage of President Donald Trump’s 20-point Gaza peace plan.

It said Hamas would return its 48 living and dead hostages within 72 hours of the October 10 ceasefire.

All 20 living Israeli hostages were released on October 13 in exchange for 250 Palestinian prisoners and 1,718 Gazan detainees.

Israel also handed over the bodies of 195 Palestinians in exchange for the bodies of the 13 Israeli hostages returned by Hamas so far, along with those of two foreign hostages, one Thai and the other Nepali.

Eleven of the dead hostages still in Gaza are Israeli, one is Tanzanian and one is Thai.

On Saturday, Hamas chief negotiator Khalil al-Haya said the group faced challenges because Israeli forces had “changed the terrain of Gaza.” He also said that “some of those who buried the bodies have been killed or no longer remember where they buried them.”

However, the Israeli government insists that Hamas knows the location of all the bodies.

All but one of the dead hostages, still in Gaza, were among 251 people abducted during the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on October 7, 2023, in which about 1,200 others were killed.

Israel responded by launching a military campaign in Gaza that killed more than 68,530 people, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.