Gaza tunnel blast: Death toll rises to 12

“We announce the death of five new heroes of the Jerusalem Brigades in Zionist bombing,” Islamic Jihad said in a statement, referring to its military wing.

Two of the 12 dead belonged to the militant wing of Hamas, the Islamist group that controls Gaza, with the other 10 from Islamic Jihad.

Since Monday’s explosion, Israel has refused to allow the Palestinian Civil Defence Authority access to the site to search for survivors.

The International Committee of the Red Cross had asked Israel to enable searches in the tunnel, according to a statement yesterday from COGAT, the defence ministry unit which liaises with the Palestinian territories.

COGAT commander Yoav Mordechai told the head of ICRC in Israel that the Israeli authorities would “not enable searches in the security perimeter in the Gaza Strip, without progress on the issue of the Israeli captives and missing soldiers.”

Israel is seeking the return of two civilians as well as the bodies of two soldiers, believed to have been killed in the 2014 war in Gaza.