Qatar slams Israeli military operation that sparked Gaza escalation

Qatar condemns Israel for an apparently botched military operation in Gaza Sunday night during which a senior Hamas officer was killed and which sparked the current violence.

“The State of Qatar expressed its strong condemnation and denunciation of the Israeli shelling of Khan Younis in the southern Gaza Strip that left a number of martyrs and injuries,” the Foreign Ministry in Doha says in a statement.

The Gulf state, which last week gave $15 million in cash to the authorities in Gaza, says it considers the event “a serious military escalation” that complicates “the already difficult situation in the Gaza Strip as a result of the suffocating siege imposed on it for years.”

One Israeli officer was killed in the operation, along with seven Palestinian operatives.

— Raphael Ahren