An air attack by Israeli forces on Sunday resulted in the deaths of two senior officers from the Hamas-run Palestinian internal security service, according to medics and police officials in the Gaza Strip. The strike struck a vehicle as it moved through Deir Al-Balah in central Gaza.
Medics and the Hamas-controlled interior ministry identified the dead as Colonel Wael El-Ledawi, who headed the internal security service for central Gaza, and Major Ramez Abu Zraiq. Both men were reported killed while travelling together in the vehicle.
The Israeli military acknowledged conducting a strike targeting a Hamas militant but released no additional details on the operation or the identities of those killed. The announcement did not elaborate on the circumstances that led to the decision to strike or on any intelligence cited to justify the action.
Over recent months, Israeli operations have killed dozens of members of the Hamas-led police force, including senior officials. Israel has said in previous statements that many of those targeted were members of Hamas’s armed wing and posed imminent threats to Israeli civilians and forces operating in and around Gaza.
Hamas has consistently criticised Israeli attacks on its police force and on police headquarters, saying such strikes are intended to create chaos and anarchy in the densely populated enclave and that they violate the U.S.-brokered October ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.
Gaza health authorities report that more than 1,190 Palestinians have been killed by Israeli strikes since the ceasefire took effect, and they say the majority of those killed were civilians. The health authorities’ count is noted as coming from Gaza officials; Hamas itself typically does not release its own casualty figures.
While the ceasefire halted full-scale hostilities, it has not stopped near-daily Israeli strikes across the territory. During the same period covered by the truce, militants in Gaza have killed four Israeli soldiers, officials said.
Israeli forces are described as effectively controlling an estimated 64% of the Gaza Strip, a narrow coastal territory that has suffered heavy bombardment over a two-year military campaign that followed the 2023 Hamas attack on southern Israel. Nearly all of Gaza’s roughly 2 million residents now live on a small stretch of coastal land, largely in makeshift tents or in heavily damaged structures, under Hamas administration and confronting severe living conditions.