Israel strikes Gaza after Hamas fires rocketsc

JERUSALEM/GAZA — Israeli airstrikes killed at least 44 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip on Sunday, according to Gaza's Civil Defense Agency, following a rocket barrage fired from the enclave by Hamas.

Separately, Palestinian authorities reported that a 14-year-old Palestinian-American boy was fatally shot by Israeli forces during clashes in the occupied West Bank.

The violence escalated after Hamas's armed wing, the Al-Qassam Brigades, launched rockets into southern Israel earlier on Sunday, which the group described as retaliation for Israeli "massacres "of Palestinian civilians. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu condemned the rocket fire as "unacceptable" and vowed a "forceful response".