HAMAS DEPUTY MILITARY COMMANDER KILLED IN GAZA AIR RAID: ISRAEL

Tue 26 March 2024:

Hamas deputy military commander Marwan Issa was killed in an Israeli air strike this month, Israel’s military spokesperson says.

“We have checked all the intelligence,” Rear-Admiral Daniel Hagari said in a televised statement. “Marwan Issa was eliminated in the strike we carried out around two weeks ago.”

Issa was at the top of Israel’s most-wanted list together with Mohammed Deif, the head of Hamas’s military wing, the Izz el-Deen al-Qassam Brigades, and Hamas’ leader in Gaza Yahya Sinwar.

There was no immediate comment from Hamas. The White House said on March 18 that Issa had been killed, but Israel had not confirmed his death until now.

The Israeli military previously said it targeted Marwan Issa in an air raid on an underground compound in central Gaza on March 9.

The claim comes after the United Nations Security Council passed a resolution demanding an immediate ceasefire in Gaza, and amid growing calls for Israel to halt its nearly six-month assault on the besieged enclave, which Palestinian health officials say has so far killed more than 32,000 people.

If the claim is accurate, Issa would be the highest-ranking Hamas leader to have been killed in Gaza since the start of the assault in October.

The United States announced last week that Issa had been killed in an Israeli strike, but Israel had not confirmed his death until now.

Hamas’s top leader in Gaza, and the alleged mastermind of the October 7 attack that triggered Israel’s latest assault on Gaza, is Yahya Sinwar.

Both Sinwar and Deif are believed to be alive and in hiding in Gaza, and Israel has vowed to kill them.

Israel says it has killed more than 13,000 Hamas fighters since the start of the war, but has not provided any evidence to support its claims.

Al Jazeera’s Hamdah Salhut, reporting from occupied East Jerusalem, said Israeli officials have been saying since the beginning of their offensive that they are going to “find and kill all Hamas leadership and every single Hamas fighter on the ground”.

“It wasn’t just going to be in Gaza. It was going to be all over the world and countries like Lebanon, Turkey and Qatar as well,” Salhut said.

Al Jazeera’s senior political analyst Marwan Bishara said every time Israel “declared victory by assassinating one Hamas leader, dozens stepped up to take his place”.

“The idea of declaring victory because one or two, or several Hamas leaders were killed, has proven to be more of a facade,” Bishara said.

“Killing these leaders might be claimed to be a tactical or strategic victory. But at the end of the day, Hamas has proven more than capable of producing more and more leaders,” he added.

SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES

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