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04-01-2024
BEIRUT: Senior Hamas official Saleh al-Arouri has been martyred in an Israeli drone strike on Beirut’s southern suburb of Dahiyeh, the Palestinian group and Lebanese media outlets say.
Al-Arouri was killed on Tuesday in a “treacherous Zionist strike”, Hamas said on its official channel. Hamas politburo member Izzat al-Sharq called it a “cowardly assassination”.
Al-Arouri was a senior official in Hamas’s politburo and was known to be deeply involved in its military affairs. He had previously headed the group’s presence in the occupied West Bank.
Samir Findi Abu Amer and Azzam Al-Aqraa Abu Ammar, leaders of Hamas’ armed wing, the Qassam Brigades were also killed, Hamas said in a message on its Telegram channel.
It named four other members of the group who were also killed.
Earlier, Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency said the blast killed at least six people and that it was carried out by an Israeli drone.
Hamas said al-Arouri’s killing would not “undermine the continued brave resistance” in Gaza, where the Palestinian group’s fighters are battling Israeli ground forces.
“It proves once more the utter failure of the enemy to achieve any of its aggressive goals in the Gaza Strip,” senior Hamas official Izzat al-Rishq said in a statement.
The group’s top leader Ismail Haniyeh condemned the attack as a “terrorist act”, a violation of Lebanon’s sovereignty, and an expansion of Israel’s circle of hostility against Palestinians.
Haniyeh said in televised remarks that Hamas “will never be defeated”.
There was no immediate comment from Israel.
Mark Regev, an adviser to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, told the United States news channel MSNBC that Israel had not taken responsibility for the attack but “whoever did it, it must be clear that this was not an attack on the Lebanese state”.
“Whoever did this did a surgical strike against the Hamas leadership,” Regev said in an interview.
Senior Hamas official Saleh al-Arouri has been killed in an Israeli drone strike on southern Beirut, Lebanon, Hamas says. Israel has not officially claimed responsibility.
Hezbollah says the attack on Lebanon’s capital, which killed at least six people “will not pass without punishment”.
The Palestinian Red Crescent said an Israeli strike on al-Amal Hospital in Khan Younis in southern Gaza has killed at least five Palestinians.
At least 22,185 people have been killed and at least 57,000 injured in Israeli attacks on Gaza since October 7. The revised death toll from the October 7 attack in Israel stands at 1,139. (Int’l News Desk)
