Palestinian media said that the Israeli occupation army dropped explosive barrels on residential neighborhoods in the northern Gaza Strip, causing very powerful explosions and causing ground tremors that were felt by residents of Gaza City.
Tel Aviv Tribune’s correspondent also reported on Wednesday that last night, Israeli occupation aircraft dropped explosive barrels on residential neighborhoods in northern Gaza.
Explosive barrels – as military experts say – are a metal container in the form of a barrel, a cement container, or a metal cylinder, which is filled with highly explosive materials and fuel to cause fires as they fall, in addition to metal fragments and nails, and the extent of their explosion may form a circle with a diameter of up to about 250 meters.
Israel and explosive barrels
Military and strategic expert Hatem Al-Falahi said that Israel was one of the first countries to use explosive barrels in 1948, when during the Nakba, it bombed the town of Saffuriyya in Galilee (northern occupied Palestine) with 3 explosive barrels, causing great terror among the residents of the village, which was completely destroyed.
Al-Falahi added – in statements to Tel Aviv Tribune Net – that explosive barrels were subsequently used in 1968 by the United States in the Vietnam War, with the aim of burning large areas of forests.
Following the outbreak of the revolution in Syria in 2011, the Syrian regime greatly expanded the use of these barrels, and dropped about 82 thousand barrels between 2012 and 2021, causing great destruction to many Syrian towns.
The military expert pointed out that in light of the destructive impact of this type of bomb, Security Council Resolution No. 2139 was issued in 2014 condemning the use of explosive barrels as terrorist and irregular weapons, and they cannot be used in this random manner that leads to great destruction.
Israeli targets
The Israeli army’s use of explosive barrels yesterday was not the first to target the Gaza Strip. It had previously planted explosive barrels in the middle of several neighborhoods before detonating them remotely, but what is new this time is that these barrels were dropped by planes randomly on residential neighborhoods.
The researcher specializing in military and security affairs, Osama Khaled, lists a number of goals that prompted Israel to resort to using this weapon in the war it has been waging against the Gaza Strip since October 7, 2023, including:
- The Israeli army believes that explosive barrels save it time and effort in reaching and advancing on the ground by eliminating entire residential squares along the routes along which the Israeli forces are advancing.
- The advancing forces get rid of any human or structural dangers that may hinder their progress through the danger of collision combat, which the military forces avoid, which may involve them in a decisive and bloody clash that may cause them great losses.
- Economy in other types of ammunition and provide them for battles in which they may be more decisive for combat operations.
- The Israeli occupation aims to raise the awareness of the population in the Gaza Strip and break the steadfastness of the popular incubator of resistance through the large scale of destruction and killing resulting from explosive barrels.
Mechanism of action
The explosive barrels are equipped with a propulsion fan in the back and a mechanical detonator in the front. Each barrel can carry between 200 and 300 kilograms of explosive materials, and is carried by fighter planes or helicopters. It falls on the targeted places randomly, causing the greatest possible damage in the area where it falls.
Al-Falahi says that today Israel has returned to using explosive barrels again because they are less expensive than traditional munitions, and they have a strong impact and very large destructive energy, and in their work they only need air superiority in combat zones, and this is what Israel has.
He added that Israel’s strategy of employing explosive barrel weapons aims to force residents in northern Gaza to evacuate their homes and be forcibly displaced from them, by causing the greatest possible amount of destruction and killing.
The military expert concluded his statements to Tel Aviv Tribune Net by saying that the use of these barrels is a new crime added to the crimes carried out by the Israeli occupation in Gaza during the last period, as their use is a violation of international laws and regulations and a terrorist crime that leads to genocide against the residents of the Gaza Strip.
For more than a year, Israel – with American and Western support – has been waging a devastating war on the Gaza Strip, which has left more than 143,000 Palestinian martyrs and wounded, most of them children and women, and more than 10,000 missing, amid massive destruction and famine that killed dozens of children and the elderly, in one of the worst… Humanitarian disasters in the world.