A Hamas terrorist who took part in the abduction of Col. Asaf Hamami, the commander of the Gaza Division’s Southern Brigade, and two of his soldiers, Staff Sgt. Tomer Ahimas and Sgt. Kiril Brodski, during the October 7, 2023, onslaught, was killed in a strike in the Gaza Strip yesterday, the IDF announces.
The strike in southern Gaza killed Hassam Shafai, a member of Hamas’s East Khan Younis Battalion, according to the military.
On October 7, Shafai raided Kibbutz Nirim, where Hamami and his team were killed battling the Hamas invasion, and took part in abducting their bodies.
The military says that Shafai, during the war and recently, advanced attacks and therefore he “posed a threat to our forces operating in the Gaza Strip.”
Hamas returned the body of Hamami in November 2025 as part of a hostage deal. The bodies of Ahimas and Brodski were recovered in military operations in Gaza in 2024.
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Wednesday, July 15, 2026
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