Israel killed Hamas deputy leader Saleh Al Arouri in a drone strike in Lebanon’s capital Beirut yesterday, Lebanese and Palestinian security sources said, as its forces kept pummelling parts of Gaza, vowing further ‘high-intensity’ warfare against the group in the enclave.
Hamas’ Al Aqsa Radio and Lebanon’s pro-Iranian Mayadeen TV confirmed word from security sources that Arouri, a member of the Palestinian movement’s politburo based abroad and a co-founder of Hamas’ military wing, the Qassam Brigades, had been killed when a drone struck a Hamas office in south Beirut.
In all, the drone attack killed six people in the city’s southern suburb of Daliyeh, the Lebanese state news agency reported earlier, underlining the risk of the war spreading well beyond the Gaza Strip.
Lebanon’s heavily armed Hizbollah group has been exchanging near-daily fire with Israel across Lebanon’s southern border since the Gaza war erupted in early October.
Lebanon’s caretaker prime minister Najib Mikati condemned the drone blast as a ‘new Israeli crime’ and said it was an attempt to pull Lebanon into war.
Lebanon last night said it is planning to submit a complaint to the UN Security Council against ‘blatant’ strike in Beirut’s southern suburb and all ‘new Israeli violations of Lebanese sovereignty’.
“I am waiting for martyrdom (death) and I think I have lived too long,” Arouri said in August 2023, alluding to Israeli threats to eliminate Hamas leaders whether in Gaza or abroad.
The Gaza health ministry said 207 people had been killed in the past 24 hours, bringing the total recorded Palestinian death toll to 22,185 in nearly three months of war in Gaza, the most lethal chapter of the decades-long Israel-Palestinian conflict.
Hundreds of Palestinians took to the streets of Ramallah in the West Bank to condemn Arouri’s killing, chanting, “Revenge, revenge, Qassam!”
Civilian casualties have mounted in south Gaza as the brunt of Israel’s offensive has shifted there from the north.
The US, Israel’s main supporter, has been urging it to rein in its air and ground blitz, which has demolished vast tracts of densely populated Gaza, in favour of more targeted strikes.
Israel has announced plans to pull back some troops, hinting at a new phase in the war amid a rising global outcry over the plight of Gaza civilians, although also warned its offensive has many months to run.
Israeli bombardments have engulfed Gaza’s 2.3 million residents in a humanitarian disaster in which thousands have been left destitute and threatened by famine due to a lack of food supplies.
Shortly before Arouri’s killing, Hamas’ paramount leader Ismail Haniyeh, who is also based outside Gaza, said the movement had delivered its response to an Egyptian-Qatari ceasefire proposal.
He reiterated that Hamas’ conditions entailed ‘a complete cessation’ of Israel’s offensive in exchange for further releases of hostages.
Israel believes 129 hostages remain in Gaza after some were released during a brief truce in late November and others were killed during air strikes and rescue or escape attempts.
Gaza residents said Israeli warplanes and tanks stepped up bombardments of eastern and northern districts of Khan Younis, where tens of thousands of displaced Palestinians have sought refuge after being forced to flee their homes elsewhere.
In separate statements, Hamas and its Islamic Jihad allies said they fired mortar bombs and anti-tank rockets at Israeli ground forces in Khan Younis and were preventing them advancing to its western area.
- Turkish authorities have detained 34 people suspected of being linked to Israel’s Mossad intelligence service and of targeting Palestinians living in Türkiye, a senior Turkish official said yesterday, adding Mossad also recruited members in the country.
Last month, Turkish officials warned Israel of ‘serious consequences’ if it tried to hunt down members of Hamas living outside Palestinian territories, including in Türkiye. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan warned that would be a mistake.
Türkiye, unlike most of its Western allies and some Arab nations, does not classify Hamas as a terrorist organisation.
Asked about the arrests, Israeli Prime Minister’s Office and the Foreign Ministry did not immediately comment.
The official said police raided locations in eight provinces as part of an investigation carried out by the MIT intelligence agency and the Istanbul prosecutor’s counter-terrorism bureau.
“The Israeli Intelligence Service is recruiting personnel to be used in acts against Palestinians residing in our country and their families,” the official said, adding it used job postings on social media to establish contact and later used encrypted messaging platforms to maintain communications with contacts. It uses intermediaries/live couriers for payments to be made to its contacts. It tries to lose trace of the money by using cryptocurrency,” the person said.
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