Live UpdateFrom the Liveblog of Thursday, November 16, 2023

IDF says it struck Hamas underground sites where senior commanders were hiding

By Emanuel Fabian 16 November 2023, 9:36 pm 4 Edit

Emanuel (Mannie) Fabian is The Times of Israel's military correspondent.

Smoke billows during a presumed Israeli bombing in the Gaza Strip on November 16, 2023. (Jack Guez/AFP)

IDF Spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari says the military carried out two major airstrikes on Hamas underground infrastructure in the Gaza Strip in recent days.

In one of them, a number of senior Hamas commanders were hiding, including Ahmed Ghandour, the commander of Hamas’s northern Gaza brigade, and Ayman Siam, the head of Hamas’s rocket firing array, Hagari says.

In another underground site, Hagari says senior members of Hamas’s politburo were hiding, including Rawhi Mushtaha, Essam al-Dalis and Sameh al-Siraj.

“Hamas is trying to hide the results of the strike,” he says.

Hagari says he cannot elaborate further on the strike, but that “it can be said with certainty that the underground where they were was very heavily damaged.”