Gaza rocket lands near Nir Am, missile fired at chopper, as IAF pounds Hamas targets
IDF orders evacuation from Bureij area that saw shoulder-launched missile fired at helicopter, downed by Iron Dome; Nahal Brigade demolishes tunnels, kills gunmen in Beit Hanoun

Rocket sirens sounded several times Friday in Israeli communities along the Gaza border, in the eighth straight day of incoming fire from the enclave, as the IDF said it launched airstrikes against some 40 staging grounds of terror operatives and Hamas command centers across the territory over the past day.
A siren in Be’eri midday Friday was triggered by a surface-to-air missile launched at an Israeli Air Force helicopter flying over Gaza, according to military sources.
The shoulder-launched missile, fired by a gunman in the Bureij area of central Gaza, did not come close to hitting the helicopter, and was successfully shot down by the Iron Dome air defense system, the sources said.
A few hours later, two rockets were launched from the northern Gaza Strip at the southern border city of Sderot. According to the military, one of the rockets impacted near Kibbutz Nir Am, while another hit an open area.
The attack marked the eighth day in a row of rocket fire from Gaza, with at least 16 rockets fired during that time.
Rocket fire has generally become rare since the early months of the ongoing multi-front war, which began on October 7, 2023, when the Hamas terror group invaded southern Israel, killing some 1,200 people and taking 251 hostages.
טיל כתף נורה לעבר מסוק בעזה – והפעיל אזעקה בבארי; רקטות שוגרו לשדרותhttps://t.co/367tVbNolK pic.twitter.com/LDmERmg0Su
— ynet עדכוני (@ynetalerts) January 3, 2025
Following the sirens in Be’eri, the IDF issued an evacuation warning for Palestinian civilians in the Bureij area of central Gaza.
“Terror organizations are once again firing rockets from this area that has received warnings several times in the past,” Col. Avichay Adraee, the IDF’s Arabic-language spokesman said on X, attaching a map of the areas to be evacuated.
Civilians were urged to head for the Israeli-designated humanitarian zone in southern Gaza before the IDF launched strikes on the area.
#عاجل ‼️ الى سكان قطاع غزة المتواجدين في البلوكات: 2220-2223 (منطقة البريج)
????هذا تحذير مسبق قبل هجوم وبعد عملية الاطلاق نحو منطقة غلاف غزة قبل قليل
⭕️تطلق المنظمات الإرهابية القذائف الصاروخية مرة اخرى من هذه المنطقة التي تم تحذيرها عدة مرات في الماضي.
⭕️من أجل أمنكم، انتقلوا… pic.twitter.com/0ji7TjlCNV— افيخاي ادرعي (@AvichayAdraee) January 3, 2025
The IDF also said Friday it had launched airstrikes against some 40 targets across the Gaza Strip over the past day, including staging grounds for terror operatives as well as Hamas command centers.
The strikes were launched by the Israeli Air Force in a joint operation with the IDF’s Southern Command, using intelligence provided by the Military Intelligence Directorate and Shin Bet security agency.
The IDF said dozens of Hamas operatives were gathered at the targeted sites, from which they planned and launched attacks against troops in Gaza and against Israel.
Some sites were embedded in former schools, which have also served as shelters for displaced Palestinians.
The IDF said this was “another example of Hamas’s cynical and systematic use of civilians and civilian infrastructure in the Gaza Strip for terror purposes.”
The military said it took steps to mitigate civilian harm in the strikes, including by using “precision munitions, aerial surveillance and other intelligence.”
Also on Friday, the IDF released drone footage from one former school in northern Gaza’s Jabalia where Hamas operatives had been holed up. The video showed several assault rifles inside the damaged school building.
According to the IDF, the school was searched by troops of the Givati Brigade, who found numerous weapons. In a nearby residential building, the military said, the troops found RPGs in a child’s bedroom.
Also during the operations in Jabalia, the IDF said the Givati troops, using a drone, spotted terror operatives planting bombs close to where they were operating. The operatives were eliminated and the explosive device was destroyed, the military added.
The IDF’s statement came amid local reports in Gaza that at least 30 people, including children, were killed in Gaza by Israeli strikes overnight and into Friday morning.
Staff at the Al Aqsa Martyrs Hospital said more than a dozen women and children were killed in strikes that hit various locations in Central Gaza, including Nuseirat, Zawaida, Maghazi and Deir al Balah.

Dozens of people were also killed across the enclave the previous day, they said, bringing the purported total of people killed in the past 24 hours to 56. Figures from the Hamas-run health authorities in the strip are not independently verified, and they do not distinguish between civilians and combatants.
Troops of the IDF’s Nahal Brigade also destroyed several Hamas tunnels and weapons during operations this past week in northern Gaza’s Beit Hanoun, the military announced Friday. The IDF launched a fresh operation in Beit Hanoun last weekend.
The military said that the Nahal troops, operating under the Gaza Division, killed several cells of gunmen and demolished infrastructure used by terror groups, including tunnels.
The troops also located numerous weapons, including rocket launchers, mortars, RPGs and explosive devices, along with other equipment, the IDF said.
The brigade has also directed several airstrikes in Beit Hanoun, the IDF said, including a drone strike on a rocket launcher used by terrorists in a previous attack on Israel.

Meanwhile, COGAT, the Defense Ministry body responsible for overseeing the delivery of humanitarian aid to Gaza, said that 1,200 units of blood and 3,000 units of plasma were delivered Thursday to Nasser Hospital, in southern Gaza’s Khan Younis via the Kerem Shalom Crossing.
COGAT said the blood and plasma were delivered “to support ongoing treatments and maintain essential operations at the hospital.”
The operation was carried out in coordination with international organizations, COGAT said, adding the transfer underwent “stringent security inspections.”
“The IDF, through COGAT, will continue to act in accordance with international law to provide humanitarian assistance to the residents of the Gaza Strip, especially as it pertains to medical care,” it added.

According to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry, more than 45,000 people in the Strip have been killed or are presumed dead in the fighting so far, though the toll cannot be verified and does not differentiate between civilians and fighters. Israel says it has killed some 18,000 combatants in battle as of November and another 1,000 terrorists inside Israel on October 7.
Israel has said it seeks to minimize civilian fatalities and stresses that Hamas uses Gaza’s civilians as human shields, fighting from civilian areas including homes, hospitals, schools and mosques.
Israel’s toll in the ground offensive against Hamas in Gaza and in military operations along the border with the Strip stands at 395. The toll includes a police officer killed in a hostage rescue mission and a Defense Ministry civilian contractor.