Israel accuses Hamas of planning attacks with kites and balloons

Dan Williams and Fares Akram, Bloomberg News on Aug 24, 2026

By clicking submit, I authorize Arcamax and its affiliates to: (1) use, sell, and share my information for marketing purposes, including cross-context behavioral advertising, as described in our Privacy Policy , (2) add to information that I provide with other information like interests inferred from web page views, or data lawfully obtained from data brokers, such as past purchase or location data, or publicly available data, (3) contact me or enable others to contact me by email or other means with offers for different types of goods and services, and (4) retain my information while I am engaging with marketing messages that I receive and for a reasonable amount of time thereafter. I understand I can opt out at any time through an email that I receive, or by clicking here

Israeli officials accused Hamas of planning renewed attacks on its territory using kites and balloons, and gave the Iran-backed militant group until Wednesday to rein in their use or face reprisals.

The Israel Defense Forces has been instructed to “adopt a policy of zero containment and zero tolerance toward the launching of kites and balloons from Gaza toward the communities of the Negev,” Defense Minister Israel Katz said in a statement on Monday, referring to a region targeted during the October 2023 Hamas attacks that triggered the war in Gaza.

“If the launches continue, forceful action will be taken to put an end to the phenomenon,” he said. “A balloon or kite will be treated the same as a drone, with or without explosives.”

In the years leading up to the Oct. 7 attacks, kites and balloons with braziers or explosive devices attached were launched from Gaza and caused fires that burnt thousands of acres of farmlands and forests in Israel. The weekend discovery of a half a dozen kites that landed in communities along the border — albeit with no such payloads — triggered concerns about a resumption of such attacks.

Hamas denied planning a new offensive.

“Israel gives Hamas three days to stop launching kites or else it will launch a massive aerial attack,” Bassem Naim, a Hamas official, said in a post on social media on Sunday. Israel is seeking “to deal harshly with paper airplanes emerging from Gaza, launched by children in search of their innocent childhood amid the rubble.”

The standoff threatens to undermine a U.S.-brokered ceasefire in October 2025 that brought a tentative end to two years of all-out war between Israel and Hamas. Some 1,200 Israelis died in the initial Hamas attacks, while more than 70,000 Palestinians were killed in the fighting that followed. Gaza was largely destroyed during the conflict, with reconstruction efforts yet to get off the ground.

Israeli troops currently occupy two-thirds of Gaza and have continued to attack Hamas strongholds, killing more than 1,200 Palestinians in the territory since the truce, according to the Hamas-run health ministry. Attempts to broker a more lasting truce and an Israeli withdrawal have been held up largely by differing views over how and when Hamas will disarm.

Rafi Babian, head of security at a regional council responsible for a cluster of border communities that lost scores of people when Hamas infiltrated the border, said he had examined two kites that fell in the area with strings of as long as 4.5 kilometer (2.8 miles). Israeli security officials said this suggests Hamas may be preparing to utilize fiber optic drones that Hezbollah has used to great effect against Israel in the north.

The long strings attached to the kites sends “a message, and we need to respond to that message very, very clearly,” Orit Strock, a minister in Israel’s security Cabinet, told Army Radio on Monday.

An Israeli group of Oct. 7 survivors, known as the October Council, on Monday released a report saying soldiers and field observers had witnessed Hamas rearming, including building rockets and incendiary kites.