IDF says terrorist behind 2002 Beersheba bombing killed in recent Gaza strike
Drone strike comes as military presses campaign against Hamas, with targets including weapons depots, rocket launchers; Palestinians: At least 21 killed in past day
A recent Israeli drone strike in Gaza City killed one of the Hamas terrorists behind a 2002 bombing attack in Beersheba who was released from prison in the 2011 Shalit deal, the military said Wednesday, as it pressed its offensive against the terror group in northern Gaza.
Israeli authorities said Murad Al-Rajoub was one of two Hamas terrorists behind the May 2002 attack in which 10 civilians were wounded. He had been sentenced to 38 years before being released and deported to Gaza in the 2011 deal in which Israel exchanged 1,027 terror convicts for captive IDF soldier Gilad Shalit.
According to Palestinian media, al-Rajoub was killed in a strike last Friday, along with three other Palestinians.
Meanwhile, the IDF said it was continuing an offensive against Hamas in the Strip’s northern towns of Beit Lahiya and Jabalia, launched in October to stop Hamas efforts to regroup in the area.
Fighter jets struck dozens of Hamas weapon depots, buildings used by the terror group and other infrastructure in the area overnight, according to the military.
The IDF said many of the targets were identified based on intelligence obtained from the interrogation of detained terror operatives.
Local sources: Murad Rajoub, the freed prisoner deported to Gaza, from the city of Dura, south of Hebron, was killed in an airstrike on Al-Nasr Street#Hebron #WestBank #Palestine @qudsn pic.twitter.com/WDjbTRUS9S
— ⚡️???? World News ????⚡️ (@ferozwala) November 22, 2024
Hamas-run Gaza authorities said Thursday that IDF strikes had killed at least 21 Palestinians across the Strip, as forces stepped up their strikes in central areas and tanks pushed deeper into the north and south of the enclave.
The figures could not be independently verified. Contacted by Reuters, the IDF said its forces were continuing to “strike terror targets as part of the operational activity in the Gaza Strip.”
Palestinian medics said six people were killed in two separate airstrikes on a house and near the Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahiya in the northern Gaza Strip, while four others were killed when an Israeli strike hit a motorcycle in Khan Younis in the south.
In the Nuseirat camp in central Gaza, Israeli planes carried out several airstrikes, destroying a multistory building and hitting roads outside mosques. At least 11 people were killed in those strikes, according to officials at Al-Awda Hospital.
They said in a statement that dozens of families were trapped in their homes after some tanks advanced from the northern area of the camp and that ambulances were unable to reach them because of continued tank fire.
The IDF released footage of one of the airstrikes, targeting a Hamas operative preparing to launch rockets from Jabalia.
The military said the rockets were being set up in a building next to a weapons depot, where several other operatives were holed up. Strikes were carried out against the primed rockets and weapons depot, killing the Hamas operatives, according to the IDF.
Overnight Tuesday troops of the Givati Brigade’s reconnaissance unit raided a former school in Jabalia where the IDF said it had intelligence Hamas operatives had gathered. Many gunmen were killed in close-quarters combat and in airstrikes during the operation at the al-Harthani School, according to the military.
The former school was also serving as a shelter for displaced Palestinians.
The IDF also said Hamas operatives launched anti-tank projectiles at troops from within the Indonesian Hospital in Beit Lahiya.
The military said Wednesday that troops had enabled thousands of civilians to evacuate from combat areas over the past day, adding that among them were several suspected terror operatives who were detained and taken to Israel for interrogation.
In Rafah, near the border with Egypt, tanks pushed deeper into the northwest area of the city, according to Palestinian residents.
The operations in Gaza took place as a fragile ceasefire halted 14 months of clashes on the northern border initiated by Hezbollah in October 2023 in support of Hamas after its brutal attack on southern Israel.
“I hope a ceasefire will happen like it did in Lebanon… I just want to take my children to see my land, my house, to see what they did to us, I want to live in safety,” said Amal Abu Hmeid, a displaced woman in Gaza.
“God willing, we will have a truce,” she said, sitting in the courtyard of a school sheltering displaced families in Khan Younis.
Announcing the Lebanon accord on Tuesday, US President Joe Biden said he would now renew his push for a ceasefire agreement in Gaza, urging Israel and Hamas to seize the moment.
An Egyptian delegation was reportedly meeting Israeli officials Thursday to present a “comprehensive vision” for Gaza.
