Gaza Strip: Israel destroys rocket launcher after Islamists fire missile at southern towns

Israel responded with an airstrike against a rocket launcher in the Gaza Strip after Islamists fired a missile into its territory on 23 June in the latest round of simmering tensions in the area.

Israel's security forces said that Gaza's ruling Hamas faction was responsible for rocket fire from the Strip.

"Hamas is the address and it bears responsibility," the IDF added.

Gazan militants - said to be part of a Salafi Islamic State affiliate - fired a single rocket at southern Israel, setting off air raid sirens in the regions of Yad Mordechai, Karmiya, Zikim, and Nativ Ha'asara.

The IDF said the rocket fell in an open area and no injuries or damage were reported. No group claimed responsibility.

There has been a constant trickle of rocket attacks over the past few months, as the Salafis have tried to provoke Hamas and Israel into a response.

The chairman of the local regional council, Yair Farjun, was quoted in Haaretz as saying: "It doesn't matter to us who fired the rocket. Hamas is responsible and we won't let them set our daily schedule."

Haim Yellin, a Likud member of parliament, said: "I expect the UN secretary general to harshly condemn the war crime carried out tonight from the Gaza Strip."

And far right former Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman said: "Whoever is willing to accept the drizzle will in the end find himself in downpour. We must not accept this situation. A government willing to accept this situation less than a year after a military operation which cost the lives of soldiers and disrupted lives in an entire country over the course of two months has no right to exist."