Gaza Death Toll Rises As Israel Kills Top Militant

EKO HOT BLOG reports that Israel has killed a second top militant from the Palestinian Islamic Jihad group, as the death toll continues to rise from air strikes in Gaza.

Six children and several PIJ fighters – including leaders Khaled Mansour and Tayseer Jabari – are among the 32 Palestinians reported to have died.

Nearly 400 Palestinian rockets and mortars have been fired at Israel since Friday, an Israeli official said.

Israel says it launched the operations due to “immediate threat” from PIJ.

The latest violence is the most serious flare-up between Israel and Gaza since an 11-day conflict in May 2021 left more than 200 Palestinians and a dozen Israelis dead.

The Israeli military is warning this latest operation – codenamed Breaking Dawn – could last for a week.

In a second day of violence, Israel on Saturday killed senior PIJ leader Khaled Mansour in an air strike on a house in Rafah, southern Gaza.

The commander had previously survived five assassination attempts by the Israeli military, who accused him of planning militant operations out of Gaza.

His death follows a deadly Israeli air strike against Tayseer Jabari, another top PIJ commander, on Friday.

As well as air strikes on Gaza, some 19 members of PIJ have been arrested in raids across the occupied West Bank, according to Israel.

Sirens warning of incoming missiles continued to sound in Israeli towns on Saturday, amid more reports of air strikes in Gaza.

Gaza’s health ministry blamed “Israeli aggression” for the deaths of Palestinians, and for the 203 people wounded.

Israel accused PIJ militants of accidentally causing at least some of those deaths – claiming on Saturday that the group fired a stray rocket killing multiple children in Jabalia, in the Gaza Strip. The BBC has not been able to independently verify this claim.

So far Hamas, the biggest militant group in the area – which has similar ideology to Islamic Jihad and often coordinates its actions with it – does not seem to be firing from its large rocket arsenal.

As a result, there are no reports of Israeli air strikes targeting Hamas, which would mark an escalation in the violence.