Earlier this week, the Israeli military again targeted the family of the senior political leader of Hamas, Ismail Haniya, killing ten civilians, including his elderly sister.
This is the second time during this current nine-month long invasion that the Israeli military targeted Haniyeh’s family for assassination by missile.
The first time, on April 10, 2024, on the first day of the Al-Fitr Muslim feast that marks the end of the holy month of Ramadan, an Israeli drone fired a missile at a car carrying members of Haniyya’s family in the Shati’ refugee camp, in Gaza City, killing three of his sons, Hazem, Amir and Mohammad, and two of his grandchildren.
It is worth mentioning that, on November 21, 2023, the army killed Haniyya’s oldest grandson, Jamal Mohmmad Haniyya, and his daughter. On November 10, the army killed Haniyya’s grandchild, Ro’a Hammad, after firing missiles at their homes.
At the time, Haniyya, in Doha – Qatar, told Al-Jazeera that that Israel has already killed at least sixty members of his family, including cousins, nephews, and nieces, and added that all Palestinians in Gaza have paid a heavy price, but is determined to create a better future, achieve liberation and independence.
In an earlier Israeli assault on Gaza, in 2014, Israeli forces had targeted Haniyeh’s family home with a missile, destroying the home but causing no casualties.
Last night, Israeli fighter jets bombed a house belonging to Haniyeh family in al-Shati refugee camp in Gaza City, levelling it to the ground upon the heads of its civilian occupants.
One of the victims was identified as Zahr Haniyeh, the sister of Hamas’s politburo chief Ismail… pic.twitter.com/zzptCYgNrY
— Quds News Network (@QudsNen) June 25, 2024
The targeting of Haniyeh’s family comes, just like the previous time, as the Palestinian Prime Minister had agreed to the terms of a peace agreement after careful negotiations between the Qatari and Egyptian mediators. Some analysts have called these assassinations an attempt by the Israeli government to undermine and subvert the ceasefire negotiations.
According to the Palestine Chronicle, some family members remain under the rubble, with most of the victims being women.
According to Al-Jazeera, search efforts for survivors are ongoing, and the death toll is expected to rise.
The attack came at a time when the Israeli army has intensified its raids on the Shati camp, also targeting a United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) shelter school, killing dozens, including children.
On April 10, three of Haniyeh’s sons and several grandchildren were killed in an Israeli raid on a civilian car in the Beach Camp, Gaza City.
The Israeli army acknowledged responsibility for the raids on the Shati camp, claiming they bombed buildings used by Hamas.
Although they did not directly mention targeting Haniyeh’s family, the Israeli Army Radio commented on the attack in which family members, including Haniyeh’s sister, were killed.
Currently on trial before the International Court of Justice for genocide against Palestinians, Israel has been waging a devastating war on Gaza since October 7.
According to Gaza’s Ministry of Health, 37,626 Palestinians have been killed, and 86,098 wounded in Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza starting on October 7.
Moreover, at least 7,000 people are unaccounted for, presumed dead under the rubble of their homes throughout the Strip.
Palestinian and international organizations say that the majority of those killed and wounded are women and children.
The Israeli war has resulted in an acute famine, mostly in northern Gaza, resulting in the death of many Palestinians, mostly children.
The Israeli aggression has also resulted in the forceful displacement of nearly two million people from all over the Gaza Strip, with the vast majority of the displaced forced into the densely crowded southern city of Rafah near the border with Egypt – in what has become Palestine’s largest mass exodus since the 1948 Nakba.
Israel says that 1,200 soldiers and civilians were killed during the Al-Aqsa Flood Operation on October 7. Israeli media published reports suggesting that many Israelis were killed on that day by ‘friendly fire’.
