At least 31 Palestinians have been killed and more than 50 wounded in fresh Israeli bombings across the Gaza Strip, rescuers and health officials have said, as conflicting reports emerged over whether Hamas was withdrawing from ceasefire talks after the targeting of the group’s top military commander.
Four attacks in various parts of Gaza City in the early hours of Sunday morning occurred less than 24 hours after Israeli forces said Mohammed Deif, who is believed to be the mastermind behind the 7 October attack on southern Israel, was the target of a strike in the city of Khan Younis in southern Gaza that, according to the territory’s emergency services, killed more than 90 people and injured 300 others.
Another 14 people were killed in a strike on Sunday morning near a UN-run school being used as a shelter for displaced people in Nuseirat, central Gaza, journalists at the scene said. Israel said Hamas militants were present in the area.
Sunday’s bombings add to what was already one of the deadliest weeks of Israeli aerial attacks on Gaza since the war broke out nine months ago.
Deif, 58, who has been on Israel’s most-wanted list since 1995 and escaped multiple Israeli assassination attempts, is believed to be the chief architect of the attack in which 1,200 people were killed and 250 kidnapped, sparking the Israel-Gaza war. More than 38,400 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s retaliatory operation in Gaza, according to the health ministry in the Hamas-administered territory, and the population of 2.3 million people is in the grips of a devastating humanitarian crisis.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said Rafa Salama, the head of Hamas’s Khan Younis brigade, was also targeted and successfully “neutralised” in the same strike. The Saudi-owned newspaper Asharq al-Aswat reported on Sunday that Hamas sources had confirmed Salama’s death.
Speaking on Saturday night, the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said: “There is still no conclusive certainty that the two [Deif and Salama] have been foiled, but I want to assure you that one way or another we will reach the top of Hamas.”
Hamas’s deputy leader, Khalil al-Hayya, told Al Jazeera TV that the group’s top military commander had not been killed and, addressing Netanyahu, said: “Deif is listening to you right now and mocking your lies.”
Another Hamas official told Agence France-Presse Deif was “fine” and working despite the Israeli attack, without providing evidence.
Deif, which means “the guest” in Arabic, is the nickname for the 58-year-old commander, whose real name is Mohammed al-Masri. He has spent years frequently changing locations to elude Israeli detection. Engaged with Hamas from a young age, the former science student orchestrated a series of suicide bombings targeting Israeli civilians in the 1990s and then again a decade later.
On 7 October, Hamas issued a rare voice recording of Deif announcing operation “Al-Aqsa Flood”.
Killing Deif would provide a much-needed morale boost for Israel, which in almost 10 months of fighting has so far failed to take out any of Hamas’s top leadership despite remarks from Netanyahu that the men were “marked for death”.
Gaza’s health ministry said the strike targeting Deif and Salama hit a camp for displaced people in the Khan Younis area, killing at least 92 Palestinians and injuring more than 300 others. Residents said they witnessed at least five “big warplanes bombing in the middle of al-Mawasi, west of Khan Younis”.
Mawasi, on the Mediterranean shoreline, is an Israeli-designated “evacuation zone” that Israel has described as safe for hundreds of thousands of displaced Palestinians. Israel’s military has not confirmed the exact location of the strike. The area has been hit before.
Hamas said Israel’s claim it had targeted leaders of the Palestinian militant group were “false” and aimed at “justifying” the attack. A senior Hamas official told AFP on Sunday that the Palestinian militant group had withdrawn from talks on a ceasefire and hostage release deal in the Gaza war because of what it called Israeli “massacres” and its attitude in negotiations.
Two Egyptian security sources told Reuters on Saturday that the latest round of Gaza ceasefire talks had been halted after three days of intense negotiations failed to produce a viable outcome, blaming Israel for lacking a “genuine intent to reach agreement”.
However, other statements from Hamas officials on Sunday denied the group had withdrawn from the talks. A spokesperson, Jihad Taha, said: “There is no doubt that the horrific massacres will impact any efforts in the negotiations.” But he added: “Efforts and endeavours of the mediators remain ongoing.”
A few hours before, Hamas’s Qatar-based political leader, Ismail Haniyeh, accused Netanyahu of seeking to block a deal to end the war with “heinous massacres”. He said in a statement that Hamas had shown “a positive and responsible response” to new proposals for a ceasefire and prisoner and hostage exchange, but “the Israeli position taken by Netanyahu was to place obstacles that prevent reaching an agreement”.
Thousands of Israelis have taken to the streets over the weekend in what have become weekly protests across the country, accusing Netanyahu of sabotaging the negotiations for political gain. Among the demonstrators were the families of hostages, who made a symbolic march from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Relatives of those still held captive in Gaza by Hamas fear the recent escalation of bombings in the Palestinian territory may hinder the safe return home of their loved ones. At least 40 hostages are believed to have died since they were seized last October, Israel says.
“In light of recent events in the Gaza Strip, the families of the hostages remind prime minister Netanyahu that there can be no victory until all 120 hostages are returned home,” read a statement from the Hostage and Missing Families Forum. “The proposed deal is in its final stages. We have been waiting for them for 282 days. Time is of the essence; there’s not a moment more to lose.”