May 3, 2024
TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Three sons of Hamas ' top political leader were killed Wednesday by an Israeli airstrike in the Gaza Strip.
Ismail Haniyeh's sons are among the highest-profile figures to be killed in the war so far. It was not immediately clear how their deaths might affect the monthslong cease-fire talks being brokered by international mediators.
The Israeli military said the men conducted militant activity in central Gaza, without elaborating.
Haniyeh confirmed the deaths in an interview with the Al Jazeera satellite channel. Haniyeh lives in exile in Qatar, where Al Jazeera is based.
The Israeli military described the three siblings as a cell commander and two military operatives.
Al-Aqsa TV said Hazem, Ameer and Mohammed Haniyeh were killed with family members in the strike near the Shati refugee camp in Gaza City. Ismail Haniyeh is originally from Shati.
The brothers were traveling with family members in a single vehicle targeted by an Israeli drone, Al-Aqsa TV said, adding that a total of six people were killed, including a daughter of Hazem Haniyeh and a son and daughter of Ameer.
Earlier, Israeli war cabinet minister Benny Gantz claimed Hamas has been defeated militarily, although he also said Israel will fight it for years to come.
“From a military point of view, Hamas is defeated. Its fighters are eliminated or in hiding” and its capabilities “crippled,” Gantz said in a statement to the media in Sderot.
But he added: “Fighting against Hamas will take time. Boys who are now in middle school will still fight in the Gaza Strip.”
Gantz reiterated the Israeli government's commitment to go into Rafah, the city at the far southern tip of the Gaza Strip where more than half the territory's 2.3 million people are now sheltering. "Wherever there are terrorist targets — the IDF will be there,” he said, referring to the Israeli military.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to achieve “total victory,” pledging to destroy Hamas' military and governing capabilities to prevent a repeat of the Oct. 7 attacks and to return hostages captured by Hamas and others that day. He says that victory must include an offensive in Rafah.
Israel launched the war in response to Hamas’ cross-border assault in which militants killed 1,200 people, mostly civilians, and took roughly 250 people hostage, according to Israeli authorities.
More than 33,400 Palestinians have been killed in the relentless fighting, according to claims by Gaza’s Hamas-controlled Health Ministry, which doesn’t differentiate between civilians and combatants in its count. Israel says it has killed some 12,000 militants.
