The 2006 shelling of Beit Hanoun was an incident on 8 November 2006 in which Israel Defense Forces shells hit a row of houses in the Gaza Strip town of Beit Hanoun, killing 19 Palestinians and wounding more than 40. The shelling followed Israel's withdrawal from the Gaza Strip in completion of a week-long operation codenamed Operation Autumn Clouds, which Israel claimed had been intended to stop the Qassam rocket attacks on Israel by Palestinian militants. Israel apologized and attributed the incident to a technical malfunction.