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An Israeli air strike has killed a senior commander of the militant group Palestinian Islamic Jihad in Gaza.
Baha Abu al-Ata died along with his wife when a missile hit their home, the group said. Four of their children and a neighbour were reportedly injured.
The Israeli military said Abu al-Ata was a “ticking bomb” who was planning “imminent terrorist attacks”.
At least 70 rockets have been fired at Israel from Gaza since the killing, which PIJ has vowed to avenge.
Twelve Israelis have been lightly wounded in rocket attacks across southern Israel, according to the Barzilai Medical Center in the city of Ashkelon.
Medics said an eight-year-old girl was also in a serious condition after collapsing as her family rushed towards a bomb shelter when an air raid siren sounded in Holon, south of Tel Aviv.
Around the same time as the attack on Abu la-Ata, two people were killed and 10 injured in an Israeli air strike on the home of another Palestinian Islamic Jihad leader in the Syrian capital, Damascus, Syria’s state news agency Sana said.
Israel did not comment on the report and it was not clear if the PIJ leader, Akram al-Ajouri, was among the dead. Sana said his son Moaz was killed.
PIJ, which is backed by Iran, has its headquarters in Damascus and is one of the strongest militant groups in Gaza.
What happened in Gaza?
An Israeli warplane fired a missile at a residential building in the eastern Shejaiya area of Gaza before dawn on Tuesday, causing an explosion that could be heard from kilometres away.
The missile hit the third floor, the home of Bahaa Abu al-Ata, killing him and his wife.
A PIJ statement confirming Abu al-Ata’s death said he was its commander in Gaza’s northern region and that he had been undertaking “a heroic jihadist action”.
The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said Abu al-Ata was “responsible for most of the terror attacks in the last year from the Gaza Strip”, including the launching of rockets towards the southern Israeli city of Sderot in August and earlier this month.
“Abu al-Ata was promoting preparations to commit immediate terror attacks in various ways towards Israeli civilians and IDF troops during the recent few days,” it added.
“The thwarting operation… was a direct act to remove an imminent threat.”
IDF spokesman Lt Col Jonathan Conricus said the “surgical strike” had destroyed only one the floor of the building where Abu al-Atta lived to minimise “collateral damage”.
He also emphasised that Israel was “not looking to further escalate the situation”.
Baha Abu al-Atta came to prominence in Gaza this year, commanding fighters of Islamic Jihad’s Al Quds brigade in the north and east of the strip.
But he acted increasingly outside of the control of the dominant militant faction Hamas, ordering rocket attacks seemingly without approval after Israeli soldiers shot and injured dozens of Palestinians during regular protests at the perimeter fence earlier this month.
A Palestinian TV presenter even warned on-air recently that his actions might see the Israelis trying to kill him.
A serious escalation in hostilities is now likely, despite Israel’s efforts to signal to Hamas that it has not returned to a wider strategy of so-called targeted killings.
How have Palestinian militants responded?
At Abu al-Atta’s funeral, senior PIJ official Khaled al-Batsh said Israel had “executed two coordinated attacks – in Syria and in Gaza – in a declaration of war”.
PIJ vowed that its retaliation would “rock the Zionist entity”.
The militant group Hamas, which runs the Gaza Strip and is considered a rival to PIJ, said Israel bore “full responsibility for the consequences of this escalation”. It warned that the killing of Abu al-Ata would “not pass without punishment”.
Following the air strike, rockets were fired from Gaza towards Israeli territory. Some were intercepted by Israel’s Iron Dome air defence system, the IDF said.
Air raid sirens sounded across parts of southern and central Israel, including Holon and Modiin, which are more than 50km (30 miles) from the border with Gaza.
Israeli aircraft targeted two militants from PIJ’s rocket-launching unit, who the IDF said “posed an immediate threat”. Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry said one Palestinian was killed and several were injured in the “Israeli escalation” in northern Gaza.
Later, the IDF began conducting retaliatory strikes against PIJ targets in Gaza.
The European Union called for an immediate end to the Palestinian rocket attacks on Israeli civilians, which it said was totally unacceptable, and said it supported Egyptian efforts to broker a rapid and complete de-escalation.
BBC
