Israeli military’s claim that planned attack by group was ‘merely spurious allegation,’ Hamas says
A truck transports a tank on the Israeli side of the border with Gaza, Israel, October 19, 2025. Photo: Reuters
Israeli forces carried out a “targeted strike” against an individual in central Gaza who planned to attack Israeli troops, the Israeli military announced Saturday.
A US-backed ceasefire is in effect between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas, just over two years after the start of the war in the Gaza Strip, but each side has accused the other of violations.
Israel said it had targeted an Islamic Jihad member. On Sunday, the Palestinian militant group said in a statement that the Israeli military’s claim that an attack was being planned by the group was a “merely spurious allegation.”
It did not specify whether any of its members had been killed in the Israeli strike.
Witnesses told Reuters they saw a drone hit a car and set it on fire. Local medics said four people were injured, but no deaths were immediately reported.
Witnesses separately said Israeli tanks shelled eastern areas of Gaza City, the largest urban area in the Gaza Strip. The Israeli military did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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Several Israeli media sites said that Israel, in a reversal of its policy of barring entry to foreign forces, had allowed Egyptian officials into the Gaza Strip to help locate the bodies of hostages captured during the Hamas-led attack on Israeli communities on October 7, 2023, which sparked the war.
As part of the ceasefire agreement, Hamas said it would return all the hostages it had kidnapped, but the remains of 13 of them are still in the enclave.
The Israeli prime minister’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
