Hamas Police Chief, Others Killed In Israeli Strike On Gaza
A devastating Israeli strike hit a tent camp in Gaza, killing the chief of the Hamas-run police force, Mahmoud Salah, and his deputy, Hussam Shahwan.
The attack, which occurred in al-Mawasi near Khan Younis, also claimed the lives of nine others, including three children of same parents and two women.
Israel’s military confirmed the strike, alleging that Shahwan was a terrorist involved in planning attacks on Israeli forces.
However, the Hamas-run interior ministry condemned the killings as an “assassination” and accused Israel of “spreading chaos” and deepening human suffering in Gaza.
The incident is part of a broader escalation of violence in Gaza, with over 30 people reportedly killed in other Israeli strikes on Thursday.
The Gaza interior ministry emphasized that the police force is a civilian protection agency providing essential services to Palestinians.
According to BBC, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has justified killings and continued bombing adding that the police force had “conducted violent interrogations of the Gazan population, violating human rights and suppressing dissent”.
“Hassam Shahwan was responsible for developing intelligence assessments in coordination with elements of Hamas’s military wing in attacks on the IDF in the Gaza Strip,” it alleged.
The military also said it had taken “numerous steps” to mitigate the risk of harming civilians prior to the strike on al-Mawasi.
Three brothers aged seven, 11 and 13 were among the nine other people who were killed.
Ahmed, Mohammed and Abdul Rahman al-Bardawil were hit by shrapnel as they slept in their family’s tent, their father Walid said.
“I woke up to the sound of the explosion. I called my three sleeping sons, but no-one answered. They were martyred immediately,” he told AFP news agency.
Social media videos showed the boys’ bodies being transported to a local hospital by a tuk-tuk, as well as their blood-stained mattresses inside a damaged tent.
Aida Zanoun, who was living in a neighbouring tent, said she heard an Apache helicopter gunship flying overhead at around 01:00 (23:00 GMT Wednesday).
“Then we saw a very strong [explosion]. It caused an earthquake in the neighbourhood. The shrapnel reached as far as 100m [330ft], they say,” she told the Reuters news agency.
“When the morning came, we came to inspect (the scene) and it is devastation, complete destruction. What have the children done, to be hit?”
The IDF has declared the sandy strip of land along the coast in al-Mawasi to be a “humanitarian zone” for the hundreds of thousands of Palestinians displaced by its 14-month war with Hamas.
But it has repeatedly attacked the area, accusing Hamas operatives of hiding among civilians.
Later, another six people were killed in an Israeli air strike at the Gaza interior ministry’s headquarters in Khan Younis, medics said.
The IDF said it had conducted a strike on “Hamas terrorists who were operating in a control-and-command centre that was embedded inside the Khan Younis municipality building”.
Palestinian media reported that at least 30 people were killed in Israeli strikes elsewhere in Gaza on Thursday.
Ten were killed in the northern town of Jabalia, which is besieged by Israeli ground forces, while four were killed in Shati refugee camp to the west, according to the Palestinian Wafa news agency. Twelve others died at two intersections in nearby Gaza City, it said.
Four people were killed in the central town of Deir al-Balah and several others were killed in nearby Maghazi refugee camp, Wafa added.
Meanwhile, recent cold, wet weather has worsened conditions in makeshift camps for displaced families.
More than 1,500 tents across Gaza have been flooded by rainwater and sewage since Tuesday, according to the Hamas-run Civil Defence agency.
“When we woke up… we were shocked to find that the rain had flooded [our tent], causing us to be submerged in sewage,” Moataz Abu Hatab told BBC Arabic’s Gaza Today programme.
“Everything we had – our mattresses, blankets, and clothes – was lost. All the items we had managed to buy or receive during the war are now gone, and we are left with nothing.”
Israel launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to the group’s unprecedented attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.
More than 45,580 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry.
