’90 Killed’ As Israeli Strike Targets Hamas Leadership (Worthy News In-depth)
By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News
JERUSALEM/GAZA (Worthy News) – Israel said Saturday it targeted the Hamas leadership in an attack in southern Gaza that killed at least 90 people, including children, according to Hamas-linked officials.
Yet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu cautioned late Saturday it was unclear if Mohammed Deif, who heads Hamas’ armed wing Izzedine al-Qassam Brigades, and second Hamas commander Rafa Salama were killed in the attack.
“There is still no absolute certainty” that they are among the dead, Netanyahu told reporters. “But one way or another, we will reach every senior member of Hamas,” deemed an Islamist “terrorist organization” by Israel, he pledged.
Deif was believed to be the chief architect of the October 7 attack that killed some 1,200 people in southern Israel and triggered the Israel-Hamas war.
The Hamas-run health ministry said the attack, the deadliest in the Israel-Hamas war so far, killed some 90 people and injured at least 300 others. Journalists counted over 40 bodies “at the overwhelmed” Nasser Hospital nearby.
Witnesses described an attack that included several strikes.
An Israeli official said the army hit “a fenced area” in the Khan Younis region of the southern Gaza Strip that was run by Hamas, adding it was not a tent camp but “an operational compound.”
HAMAS COMPOUND
The Israeli army stressed they struck a compound belonging to Hamas’ second commander, Salama, and that “dozens of Hamas terrorists” were among the dead.
Witnesses recalled that the strike landed in Muwasi, an “Israeli-designated safe zone” that stretches from northern Rafah to Khan Younis.
Palestinians had fled to the coastal area, often sheltering in tents with few essential services or supplies.
More than 80 percent of Gaza’s 2.3 million people “have been driven from their homes,” according to local Hamas officials and the United Nations.
“The [Israeli] occupation demands citizens to go to places it claims it is safe, but unfortunately, it targets it and fires missiles at it,” said Mohamad Gharib, 42, who said he was “thrown into the air” by the attack early Saturday, which consisted of what he said were at least four separate airstrikes.
Yet an Israeli military official, who spoke to reporters Saturday on condition of anonymity in line with military protocol, said that the strikes were based on “very, very accurate intelligence” and struck a “compound” used by Hamas.
The official could not verify the death toll released by Hamas-linked authorities but added, “I can confirm that there were other guards, terrorists in this compound. I can assume that they were killed.”
NO HOSTAGES
No Israeli hostages were present “as far as we know,” the official explained.
The official did not deny that the area Israel struck was in the “humanitarian area” but said it was hit “because we knew it was a Hamas compound.”
In a statement, Hamas called Israel’s claims to have targeted top commanders “false allegations” intended to “cover up the scale of the horrific massacre.”
Hamas did not use the words “horrific massacre” when its fighters killed Israelis, including raped women, babies, the elderly, and whole families, Worthy News established.
Yet there was concern Saturday that the latest Israeli attack targeting one of Hamas’s most senior operatives could threaten delicate cease-fire negotiations that U.S. President Joe Biden insisted Friday were moving in a “positive” direction.
Hamas called the attack a “dangerous escalation” after more than nine months of war.
Netanyahu said Israel would continue to put “sustained military pressure” on Hamas while cease-fire talks are underway. He added that any deal must allow Israel “to return to the battlefield until all of our objectives are met.”
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