Dov Lieber is a former Times of Israel Arab affairs correspondent.
Illustrative: Masked Hamas members carry a model of a rocket during a rally in the central Gaza Strip on December 12, 2014. (Abed Rahim Khatib/Flash90)
Two men, reportedly from a terror group, were injured on Thursday by an accidental explosion in the southern Gaza Strip.
The Gazan Health Ministry released a statement saying two men were injured by an “accidental explosion” near Khan Younis and sustained medium injuries.
The Hamas-linked news site Palinfo, along with many other Gazan news outlets, reported the explosion occurred at a site belonging to the “resistance,” which usually refers to Hamas, the terror group which controls the Gaza Strip, but could also refer to a number of other terror groups inside the enclave, including Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
Several Hamas operatives have been killed or injured in accidental blasts and tunnel collapses in recent months.
Hamas fighters and mourners gather around the bodies of seven diggers killed after a tunnel collapsed in the Gaza Strip, during their funerals in Gaza City on January 29, 2016. (AFP/MAHMUD HAMS)
Hamas is engaged in training its fighters, building rockets and digging tunnels in preparation for another round of conflict with Israel. Israel and Hamas have fought three wars since 2008.
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Gaza terrorists have dug dozens of tunnels, many reaching under the border into Israel, to launch attacks inside the Jewish state. While Israel destroyed many of them during the summer 2014 war, it says Hamas has since been rebuilding the network, and Hamas has bragged about doing so.
Last year, 22 members of Hamas’s armed wing were killed while “preparing equipment,” the majority in a string of tunnel collapses, the terror group said.
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