Palestinian Airborne Arson Attacks

The sustained airborne arson campaign emerged alongside the Gaza border demonstrations and riots known as the March of Return in spring 2018.[6] During the March 30–May 30 protest period, fire-carrying kites and balloons crossed the border fence and damaged Israeli forests and agricultural fields, although no long-term breach of the border occurred during that period.[6] The initial method was simple and inexpensive, and Israeli forces struggled to counter it.[5][7]

Incendiary kites had reportedly been used occasionally before the 2018 campaign, but their use spread again during the Return March activities.[1] Early operators launched from behind earth berms and aimed toward places where brush fires could develop or toward Israeli military positions along the border.[1] The devices subsequently expanded from kites carrying burning material to helium balloons, which could travel farther into Israel.[8]

The first incendiary-kite launch in the sustained campaign was dated to April 13, 2018, during the third Return March, when a kite carrying a Molotov cocktail was flown into Israeli territory.[8] On April 15, a fire-bomb kite caused a small fire in an agricultural field outside Kibbutz Kissufim; firefighters extinguished it before major damage occurred, and no injuries were reported.[9] The following day, an incendiary kite ignited a wheat field in the Sha’ar HaNegev Regional Council area, again without injuries.[1] That incident was described as the third consecutive day of such launches, with at least two earlier kites having caused fires, including one in Kissufim Forest.[1]

The equipment changed during the campaign’s opening weeks: initially, part of a kite was set alight, followed by the use of bottles containing incendiary material and then balloons.[10] On May 7, helium balloons carrying incendiary material caused seven fires, including in a wheat field opposite Mefalsim and in Be’eri Forest.[11] Firefighters and Jewish National Fund teams controlled the fires without reported injuries, but farmers said fields had burned shortly before harvest and estimated losses in the hundreds of thousands of shekels.[11]

A May 14 account described approximately 100 dunams of wheat burning at Kibbutz Sa’ad.[10] The farmer said the crop had been growing since November and was only weeks from harvest; he also warned that the device could have landed at a school.[10] On May 14, the day the United States formally opened its embassy in Jerusalem, 17 kites carrying flammable material caused fires at 23 locations.[9]

The scale increased in June: on June 16, dozens of incendiary kites and balloons caused 25 fires, burning crops, agricultural fields, and natural forest.[8] Figures compiled at that stage included more than 800 devices launched and about 1,000 reported fires, while a separate count covered 412 fires attended by Israel Fire and Rescue Authority personnel.[8] The same account put the burned area at more than 25,000 dunams, or over 6,100 acres.[8]

A separate contemporaneous count for June 16 listed 20 fires rather than 25.[8][4] Heat complicated firefighting as flames reached groves, agricultural fields, and beehives; one fire approached a military base before firefighters and community security coordinators stopped it.[4] No injuries were reported from those fires, but fields were damaged and a section of Road 232 temporarily closed.[4] An Israeli aircraft attacked an area where balloon launchers were operating, and reports from Gaza said at least two people were injured.[4]

Israeli responses during June included attempts to intercept kites with drones and warning shots near launch squads.[8] On the night of June 17, Israeli aircraft attacked nine Hamas targets; three rockets were subsequently fired from Gaza, two of which fell in Israeli territory.[8] The airborne launches thus occurred alongside exchanges involving aircraft and rockets, rather than only as isolated firefighting incidents.[8]

After more than 100 days of launches, one damage assessment counted 678 fires in groves and forests, with 9,160 dunams burned, mostly natural woodland.[12] It separately listed 6,000 dunams of agricultural crops and thousands of dunams of open land, while reporting 15,100 dunams burned on Jewish National Fund land.[12] On the assessment’s publication day, firefighters, local security coordinators, and Jewish National Fund teams responded to 33 fires in the border region.[12]

In July, Fire and Rescue Commissioner David Simchi announced a dedicated task force for fires caused by incendiary kites and balloons.[13] It was to combine southern-district firefighters and Home Front Command personnel, operate in two border sectors, and coordinate with the military, police, Jewish National Fund, Nature and Parks Authority, and local leaders.[13] At that point, the campaign had reportedly sparked 860 fires.[13] Fire officials attributed a decline in major blazes partly to preparedness and partly to the reduced amount of unburned land through which new fires could spread.[13]

On July 9, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced the closure of Kerem Shalom, Gaza’s main commercial crossing, in response to continued incendiary-device launches.[9] The military said humanitarian supplies, including food and medicine, would continue to pass, while the government also restricted fishing off Gaza to six nautical miles.[9] By July 30, firefighting-service figures counted 1,200 fires and more than 7,400 acres burned, including 3,000 acres of nature preserves.[3] After a temporary decline, firefighters were again dealing with between two and 15 fires daily during the reporting week.[3]

Launches fluctuated later in 2018, including a resumption after several weeks’ respite that caused two fires and a subsequent reduction associated with ceasefire measures.[9] Activity declined around November following an exchange of rocket and mortar fire and subsequent understandings, after which Hamas stopped the launches during the period covered by the annual account.[14] The fires caused no fatalities in that account’s reporting period.[14]

Incendiary-balloon launches continued during weekly Gaza fence protests in 2019, damaging farms and nature preserves.[15] By February, an Israeli military tally described thousands of aerial incendiary devices causing approximately 2,000 fires and burning more than 8,500 acres, including about 3,200 acres of nature reserves and 2,700 acres of forest.[9] Launches and fires also continued after a ceasefire.[9]

Fire totals nevertheless fell substantially in the following spring: firefighters extinguished 1,954 fires attributed to arson attacks from April through June 2018, compared with 383 in the same months of 2019.[16] The corresponding military account gave approximately 34,000 dunams burned during 2018 and 1,400 dunams damaged by incendiary devices by June 2019.[16] Reported response time improved from eight minutes to five minutes.[16] For 2019 as a whole, Eshkol Regional Council’s head estimated total damage at $3.46 million.[15]

Early 2020 accounts described balloons carrying improvised explosives suspended by strings, with some balloons bearing messages such as “I Love You” and “Happy Birthday.”[9] Most reportedly landed in open countryside, and no injuries or deaths had occurred at the time of that account.[9] After a period of relative quiet, renewed balloon activity accompanied an escalation beginning on August 6, when fragments of incendiary balloons and an explosive balloon were found near the border.[17] The Israeli military attacked Hamas underground infrastructure that night.[17]

On August 10, more than 30 fires broke out in Gaza-border communities following incendiary-balloon launches.[18] Approximately 400 dunams burned in Be’eri Forest, without reported injuries.[18] Residents’ representatives described the renewed fires and explosive balloons as part of repeated disruptions involving explosions, fires, and rocket fire.[18] Across August, the devices caused more than 400 blazes in southern Israel, while the Israeli military accused Hamas of responsibility.[19]

During the escalation beginning August 6, dozens of balloon-borne incendiary and explosive devices started dozens of fires, and Israeli tanks and aircraft subsequently struck 100 Hamas targets.[9] On August 16, Israel stopped goods transfers except food and humanitarian aid, halted fuel transfers, and restricted Gaza’s fishing zone.[9]

On May 8–9, 2021, hundreds of balloons launched into Israel caused at least 39 fires.[9] During the May escalation, Hamas and other terrorist groups, including Palestinian Islamic Jihad, launched numerous incendiary balloons, many directed toward civilian areas.[20] A published timeline states that incendiary and explosive balloons continued after the ceasefire took effect at 02:00 on May 21 and drew an Israeli Air Force response.[21]

Launches increased again after Jerusalem’s June 15 flag march.[22] Balloons caused more than 20 fires on June 15, including 15 in Be’eri Forest, followed by four fires on June 16, eight in the western Negev on June 17, and at least eight on June 18.[22] Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the June 15 fires, and Israeli aircraft attacked Hamas targets in response to launches during the period.[22]

In July 2021, investigators attributed fires near Be’eri to balloons from Gaza, while Israeli aircraft struck a Hamas weapons factory in response to earlier fires.[23] Another recurrence occurred in September 2023, when firefighters attributed five border-area fires to incendiary balloons and Palestinian sources announced launches and published images of people releasing them.[2] Three fires occurred in the Eshkol region; an earlier fire near Kissufim burned five dunams of forest beside Nahal HaBesor.[2] These were described as the first reported balloon-related fires in two years, and Israel struck three Hamas military positions in response.[2]

A September 2018 assessment put burned land over four months at approximately 32,000 dunams, or 7,900 acres.[24] Its breakdown included 12,086 dunams of national parks and nature reserves, 9,873 dunams of Jewish National Fund land, 4,237 dunams of agricultural fields, and 6,085 dunams of open land.[24] Fourteen percent of nature reserves in the Gaza-border region had burned, and damage to nature reserves alone was estimated at 15 million shekels.[24]

Particular reserves suffered disproportionately: 78 percent of the Be’eri Crater Nature Reserve, 77 percent of the Kurkar Niram Nature Reserve, and half of the Karmiya Nature Reserve burned.[24] The assessment warned that invasive plants could replace local vegetation and that recovery would require human intervention.[24] Bee-eater birds and their nests had disappeared from the Besor Reserve, while Be’eri’s wild turtle population suffered a critical blow.[24]

By October, a separate forest assessment reported approximately 3,279 acres of forest damage and another 4,000 acres of farmland destroyed.[25] It described near-daily fires over six months and identified Be’eri and Kissufim forests, areas near Sderot, and Kibbutz Lahav among the worst-affected locations.[25] Another October tally counted 1,053 fires and 11,920 dunams of forest and natural woodland burned.[26] Be’eri Forest accounted for 452 fires and Kissufim Forest for 353, followed by Shokeda with 75, Nahal Hanan with 31, and Nahal HaBesor with 29.[26] Trees and wildlife were badly affected, and some trees were expected to require years to recover.[26]

A mid-October chronology gave more than 1,000 fires and over 8,000 acres of forest and agricultural land burned, alongside millions of dollars in damage.[9] It also reported that fires destroyed 25 percent of nearby nature reserves, killing plants and animals, and that the government pledged compensation for farmers’ lost crops.[9] Government figures cited in the 2018 report counted nearly 2,000 fires and more than 5,600 acres burned.[27] Another 2018 account recorded hundreds of airborne devices from April onward, more than 7,000 acres burned, and over $2 million in damage.[28]

Financial estimates sometimes combined different weapons’ effects: a 2018 government figure of 35 million shekels, approximately $10 million, appeared in an account covering both rocket attacks and incendiary devices.[27] For 2021, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs estimated $61.7 million in combined property damage from incendiary balloons and rockets.[29] These combined estimates do not isolate the airborne-arson share.[29][27]

Civilian consequences extended beyond fields and forests: during a July 2018 visit to Sdot Negev, visitors saw blackened fields, examined remnants of kites from Gaza, and visited a kindergarten where a fire balloon had landed.[30] The teacher managed the incident, and the children returned to school the next day.[30] Some examined kite tails were made from cut-up pages of Gaza schoolchildren’s notebooks, including pages filled with questions.[30]

In August 2018, a kite approximately 13 feet wide landed on high-voltage lines near Kibbutz Sufa, causing a power outage.[31] A crane removed it before it started a fire.[31] On the same day, police sappers neutralized a balloon beside a dining room in the Eshkol region.[31] These incidents illustrated threats to electricity infrastructure and inhabited communal spaces even when a device did not ignite a major blaze.[31]

By mid-October 2018, more than 500 devices had reportedly been stopped through drone-based interception methods.[9] Military drones cut kite strings, while amateur drone racers flew through kites to shred them or used fishhooks to bring them down.[9] Residents also raised more than 50,000 shekels to purchase and develop an intercepting drone as a community initiative rather than an official military system.[26]

By April 2019, the military was developing and deploying additional interception methods, including the Pegion electro-optic rifle sight, developed by Smart Shooter with the Defense Ministry’s weapons-development administration.[5] The sight calculated when a shot should be fired at a moving target, and the military ordered thousands after a successful field pilot.[5] High-speed drones had also struck hundreds of kites and balloons, preventing some fires.[5] An Israeli officer cautioned that there was “no hermetic solution” and characterized the response as an ongoing learning competition.[5]

Rapid firefighting sometimes prevented damage after a device reached the ground: in an August 12, 2018 incident in Sha’ar HaNegev, a balloon-borne incendiary device ignited shortly after landing, but firefighters extinguished the fire within minutes without damage or injuries.[32] Five fires had been attributed to incendiary kites and balloons in the area the previous day.[32]

The lower 2019 fire totals did not establish how much improvement resulted from fewer launches rather than better interception or faster firefighting, because the military did not provide the number of balloons launched.[16] Investigations also distinguished individual fires from the broader campaign: in July 2018, fire investigators determined that a field fire at Kibbutz Nir Am had not been caused by a balloon or kite.[33]

Organizational responsibility remains a significant issue in accounts of the campaign: the Israeli military said the launches began as a grassroots phenomenon and later became an organized Hamas-led operation, citing surveillance footage and alleging that commanders directed launches and supplied materials.[34] A separate annual assessment described local origins followed by expansion and organization, while also noting that it lacked unequivocal evidence directly linking the named incendiary-kite-and-balloon unit to Hamas.[14] It nevertheless identified an individual described as a Hamas military-police operative as directly involved.[14] Conversely, a Palestinian kite-unit participant interviewed in June 2018 denied Hamas affiliation or assistance, and other launchers similarly denied taking factional orders.[7]

Interpretations of purpose also differ: an assessment connected the inexpensive devices to efforts to inflict economic and psychological damage while presenting the activity as “popular resistance.”[14] Hamas spokesmen characterized balloons in 2020 as a “nonviolent means of popular resistance,” despite their incendiary and explosive payloads.[17] Other interpretations linked the launches to pressure for easing Gaza restrictions or advancing reconstruction, while a congressional analysis offered provoking internationally criticized Israeli responses as a possible, rather than established, strategic purpose.[9][35]

Retrospective commentary preserves further estimates and descriptions: Mosaic described terrorist organizations launching devices during spring and summer 2018, giving 678 fires and more than 2,500 acres burned and stating that attacks continued over the next three years.[36] The Jerusalem Center for Security and Foreign Affairs gave an aggregate estimate of more than 2,000 incendiary kites and balloons and over 8,600 acres damaged by November 2018.[37] Such totals cover different dates, land categories, and counting methods and should not be treated as interchangeable measurements.[24][27]

The Jerusalem Center also described filmed launches involving burning balloons, flaming kites, Molotov-cocktail kites, and a rock wrapped in a burning Israeli flag.[38] In a separate article quoting a United Nations commission, the center reproduced findings that hundreds of incendiary devices caused extensive civilian-property damage, with some landing in empty educational institutions and homes and others burning crops.[39] The quoted findings included southern Israeli civilians’ psychological distress and fear of incursions, and assigned responsibility to Gaza’s de facto authorities’ police for failing to take adequate preventive measures.[39]