In a significant development, Ayman Shweidah, the deputy commander of Hamas’s Shejaiya Battalion, was killed in a recent airstrike on Gaza City, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced on Friday. This strike coincided with IDF troops raiding an UNRWA facility, allegedly used by Hamas as a command center.
The IDF stated that Shweidah was implicated in numerous attacks on Israeli forces and played a pivotal role in the October 7 offensive, where thousands of Hamas-led militants stormed southern Israel, resulting in nearly 1,200 fatalities and 251 hostages, which ignited the current conflict in Gaza.
Another key figure, Ubadah Abu Hain, a company commander within the Shejaiya Battalion, was also killed in the airstrike. The IDF described him as a prominent and experienced commander significantly involved in the ongoing hostilities. Concurrently, several rockets were launched from northern Gaza’s Beit Hanoun towards the Lachish Regional Council area in southern Israel, triggering sirens in Nir Israel, near Ashkelon.
The rockets reportedly landed in open areas, prompting retaliatory airstrikes on terror group sites in the launch vicinity. Palestinian media reported three fatalities in an airstrike on central Gaza’s Nuseirat and four aid workers killed in another strike in Khan Younis. Elsewhere in Rafah, IDF soldiers engaged and neutralized multiple gunmen during clashes and airstrikes.
IDF operations in Gaza City uncovered significant Hamas military infrastructure at an UNRWA headquarters, including weapons and a command room used to monitor Israeli forces. The troops also found parts of a Hamas drone and a cache of weapons. Israel has long accused UNRWA of facilitating Hamas activities, alleging that the agency’s facilities and funds are exploited by the terror group.
Amid ongoing military operations, IDF forces discovered a weapons manufacturing site and an underground bomb-making lab near the UNRWA headquarters. In Gaza City’s eastern neighborhood of Shejaiya, IDF operations resulted in over 150 Hamas operatives killed and eight tunnels destroyed.
The humanitarian toll has been severe, with Gaza’s civil defense agency reporting extensive destruction and numerous casualties. Meanwhile, IDF airstrikes in Khan Younis resulted in the death of Hossam Mansour, a high-ranking Hamas internal security official, further highlighting the intensifying conflict.
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