Hamas hails Turkey's intra-Palestine unity efforts as Israel bombs Gaza

Gaza's governing party Hamas has hailed Turkey's leadership for pushing Fatah faction of West Bank-based Palestinian Authority for dialogue with the rival group.

"President Erdogan has been in favour of intra-Palestine reconciliation for a long time and urges Hamas and Fatah to unite," head of Hamas resistance group Ismail Haniyah told media in Istanbul on Thursday.

"We welcomed the Turkish role to help us achieve reconciliation and end the division," he said.

Earlier this week, Erdogan received the Hamas leader in Istanbul, and also made a phone call to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

Rival factions at odds

Hamas and Fatah have remained at odds since the former seized the Gaza enclave from the latter in mid-2007 after several days of street fighting.

In 2017, the two factions signed a reconciliation agreement in Cairo in hopes of ending years of animosity and division.

Terms of the agreement, however, have never been implemented amid deep-seated differences between the two movements.

READ MORE: What is behind the Hamas-Fatah reconciliation?

Israeli strikes

Meanwhile, Israeli warplanes struck a Hamas target in occupied-Gaza overnight, the Israeli military said, even as a Qatari envoy joined efforts to broker an end to the almost three-week flare-up.

Israel has bombed the besieged enclave almost daily since August 6, in response to the launch of airborne incendiary devices and, less frequently, rockets across the border.

The fire bombs, crude devices fitted to balloons, inflated condoms or plastic bags, have triggered a rash of blazes in southern Israel that have caused significant damage to crops.

"During the day, explosive and arson balloons were launched from the Gaza Strip into Israel," the Israeli military said.

"In response ... fighter jets and (other) aircraft struck an underground infrastructure belonging to the Hamas terror organisation in the southern Gaza Strip."

Gaza blockade

The fire balloons are widely seen as an attempt by Palestinian groups to improve the terms of an informal truce under which Israel committed to ease its 13-year-old blockade in return for calm on the border.

But so far Israel's response has been to tighten the blockade. 

It has banned fishermen in occoupied-Gaza from going to sea and closed its goods crossing with the territory, prompting the closure of Gaza's sole power plant for want of fuel.

Since 2007, Gaza has groaned under a crippling Israeli blockade that has deprived its roughly two million inhabitants of many vital commodities, including food and medicine.