Israel assassinates key Hamas plotter of October 7 atrocities

Israel has claimed to have killed one of the senior plotters of Hamas’s October 7 terrorist attack in an ass­assination plot conducted behind enemy lines.

A young boy stands amid the rubble of a building in the aftermath of an Israeli strike on Gaza City on Thursday. Picture: AFP

Israel has claimed to have killed one of the senior plotters of Hamas’s October 7 terrorist attack in an ass­assination plot conducted behind enemy lines.

The Israel Defence Forces and a Shin Bet intelligence service unit operating inside the Gaza Strip killed the deputy commander of Hamas Intelligence Directorate, Shadi Baroud, who along with intelligence chief Yahya Sinwar, planned the attacks on Israeli civilians which claimed more than 1400 lives and led to the kidnap of more than 200 hostages.

Baroud was killed in an airstrike on his home called in by Shin Bet operatives on the ground two weeks after he narrowly ­escaped an airstrike that killed his wife and five children at their home in Khan Yunis.

An injured girl holds a handkerchief to her head at the Al-Nasr a hospital, following Israeli bombardment in Khan Yunis. Picture: AFP

“Using combat aircraft with precise intelligence from the IDF and the Shin Bet, today they eliminated the deputy head of Hamas’ intelligence disposition, Shadi Baroud,” the IDF said in a statement on Thursday (Friday AEDT).

“In his previous role as the head of the offensive department at the Hamas operations headquarters, Baroud had planned the attack in Israel on October 7, along with Yahya Sinwar,” the IDF added in a post on X.

Baroud also served as a battalion commander in Khan Yunis and was involved in planning several attacks against Israeli civilians. He held several roles within Hamas’s military intelligence and was responsible for the organisation’s information security. He was also in charge of intelligence ties for the organisation.

Israel has assassinated 10 other leading Hamas figures in airstrikes on Gaza since October 7, including the operations commander on the day of the attack, Hamas’s head of aerial array Murad Abu Murad, as well as unit leader Ali Qadhi and Billal Al Kedra, who was responsible for the Kfar Aza massacre.

Others to be taken out include Hamas’s most senior woman and only female politburo member Jameela Al Shanti, the window of Hamas co-founder Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi, himself assassinated by Israel in April 2004.

An Israeli Merkava tank takes part in a military drill near the border with Lebanon in the upper Galilee region of northern Israel. Picture: AFP

Hamas economy minister Joad Abu Shmalah, head of international relations Zachariah Abu Ma’amar and Muetz Eid, commander of national security in the southern district, have also been assassinated.

Baroud’s death comes as Israel says it believes at least 224 hostages are being held by Hamas, an increase of two from earlier estimates. Israeli authorities had earlier indicated one of the kidnapped victims was Australian, but both the Israeli and Australian foreign ministries said there had been a mistake in publication and were not aware of any Australians being held hostage.

On Thursday, Hamas’s spokesman Abu Obeida posted, without providing any verification, that “about” 50 of the hostages had been killed by Israeli airstrikes. This is an increase on previous Hamas reports that 22 hostages had been killed by Israeli bombing.

The Gaza health ministry also issued a 212-page document listing names and identification numbers for 7028 Palestinians it says have been killed by Israel’s bombardments in the past three weeks. There is no distinction on the list between Hamas operatives and ­civilians.

The release comes after US President Joe Biden questioned the veracity of the Palestinian civilian death toll, saying he had “no notion that the Palestinians are telling the truth about how many people are killed”.

On Thursday, a Hamas delegation, including a senior leader, Abu Marzook, visited the Kremlin, Russia Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said.

At the same time, Hamas announced that its leader, Ismail Haniyeh, had spoken with the head of Egyptian intelligence, Abbas Kamel.

In New York, Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian told the UN that Hamas was ready to release hostages in exchange for 6000 Palestinians held in Israeli prisons.

However, Mr Abdollahian also warned the US that if Israel didn’t stop its bombardment of Gaza, America would “not be spared from this fire”.

So far only four hostages, all ­female, have been released: an American mother and her daughter and two elderly Israelis. Israel announced on Thursday that it is now believed 54 of the hostages are Thais who had been farm workers on the kibbutzes near the Gaza fence.

In all, 138 of the hostages have foreign passports or dual nationality including 15 Argentinians, 12 Germans, 12 Americans, six French, six Russians, five Nepalese, two Tanzanians, two Filipinos and one each from China and Sri Lanka.

Meanwhile, the row between UN chief Antonio Guterres and ­Israel continued as Israeli President Isaac Herzog told French TV he “absolutely rejects” Mr Guterres remarks that the Hamas attack “did not happen in a vacuum” and the Palestinian people had “been subjected to 56 years of suffocating occupation”.