Israelis killed by rocket fire, anti-tank missile identified

Among the four Israeli fatalities in Sunday’s violence, Ziad al-Hamamda, 47, dies after rocket hits Ashkelon factory; Moshe Feder’s car is targeted by projectile along Gaza border

By Jacob Magid 6 May 2019, 12:06 am Edit

Jacob Magid is The Times of Israel's US bureau chief

Moshe Feder (c), who was killed after his car was struck with a Gaza rocket near the southern town of Sderot on May 5, 2019. (Courtesy)
Moshe Feder (c), who was killed after his car was struck with a Gaza rocket near the southern town of Sderot on May 5, 2019. (Courtesy)

An Israeli man killed on Sunday afternoon in a rocket attack on the southern city of Ashkelon was identified as Ziad al-Hamamda, 47, and a second victim killed earlier in the day when an anti-tank missile fired from the Gaza Strip struck his car was named as 68-year-old Moshe Feder.

The two were among the four Israelis killed in the latest round of violence, which has seen over 650 rockets fired at Israel over the weekend by Gaza terror groups and the Israel Defense Forces responding with strikes against some 300 targets throughout the Palestinian coastal enclave.

Al-Hamamda was killed when a rocket directly hit a factory in the southern city of Ashkelon. A Bedouin Israeli resident of the Negev, he is survived by his wife and seven children, according to Hebrew reports, and was buried on Sunday night.

Feder, a Kfar Saba resident, was survived by two children and his partner Iris Eden. Eden lost her first husband, Yashish Eden, in a deadly helicopter crash in 1997. Known as the “helicopter disaster,” that incident saw 73 IDF servicemen lose their lives when two aircraft collided near the northern border with Lebanon.

Speaking to the Ynet news site, Eden said she knew intuitively that Feder was the late Sunday morning casualty.

“I’ve been through a few things in my life and  I did not need an official statement [to learn] about his death,” she said. “He was my second love — a kind and generous man. We had established a family together with the children and grandchildren over the last three years.”

An Israeli soldier walks past a car hit by a missile fired from the Gaza Strip border with Israel, May 5, 2019. (Ariel Schalit/AP)

Feder was fatally wounded when an anti-tank guided missile slammed into his car as he was driving along the Route 34 highway near the community of Kibbutz Erez just north of the Gaza border. He sustained a serious shrapnel wound to the leg, causing significant blood loss. Feder was pronounced dead at Ashkelon’s Barzilai Medical Center after CPR efforts failed. The Hamas terror group claimed responsibility for the attack.

The IDF acknowledged several hours after the incident that it had failed to recognize the risks posed to Israeli drivers traveling on highways near the Gaza border.

“The specific road where the civilian’s vehicle was hit was not closed due to the distance [from Gaza]. At the time, we didn’t see that threat,” IDF spokesperson Lt. Col. Jonathan Conricus said in a briefing to reporters.

Following the attack, the army ordered parts of Route 34 closed in addition to shuttering parts of nearby Route 232.

Conricus said the military was investigating the matter and that it was “very much an ongoing event.” He added that once the IDF completes its probe of the deadly missile attack, it will release the findings to the family of the victim and the public.

Two other Israelis were killed on Sunday and at least 10 others were injured by shrapnel from rockets, missiles and mortar shells from the Gaza Strip, according to the Magen David Adom ambulance service.

Fifty-eight year-old father of four Moshe Agadi was the first fatality after being rushed to Barzilai Medical Center with shrapnel wounds he sustained when the rocket hit his home in the city at around 2:30 a.m. Sunday.

On Sunday evening, Pinchas Menachem Prezuazman, said to be in his early twenties, was killed after being struck by rocket shrapnel while running for cover in the coastal city of Ashdod.

He will be buried in Beit Shemesh at 11 p.m. on Sunday night. According to Consul General of Israel in New York Dani Dayan, Prezuazman was a dual American and Israeli citizen.

The rocket that killed Prezuazman was part of an early evening fusillade of dozens of rockets aimed at the southern Israeli cities of Sderot, Ashdod, Ashkelon, Yavneh, Gedera, and Beersheba, which have a combined population of over 600,000 residents.

Israel has responded to over 650 rockets, missiles, and mortar shells fired into its territory since Saturday with over 300 airstrikes on Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, and other terror group targets in Gaza.

Palestinian medical officials reported 29 dead since Friday, including at least 11 terrorists.

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