Islamic Jihad movement on Thursday said its militants engaged Israeli troops in southeast Gaza Strip.

In a statement sent to the media, the movement said that its fighters exchanged fire with 10 Israeli soldiers who entered al-Qarara neighborhood in the east of Khan Younis city around Thursday noon.

The movement claimed that at least three soldiers were wounded in the 15-minute clashes. There has been no comment from the Israeli army.

Witnesses said they heard the sound of heavy machine gun fire and Israeli helicopters hovered overhead in the area.

The situation around Gaza-Israel borders used to be relatively quiet after Israel ended a 22-day offensive in January, killing more than 1,300 people.

Following the offensive, Egypt failed to renew ceasefire between Israel and Islamic Hamas movement which controls the Gaza Strip. However, Hamas stopped firing rockets into Israel and took some measures to prevent the less influential movements from launching the rockets from the Gaza Strip.