Israel steps up raids on Gaza after killing Hamas chief Sinwar

Air strikes continue to pummel the Palestinian territory, with reports of least 30 killed in Jabalia refugee camp, as Benjamin Netanyahu hails ‘important landmark’ in the killing of Yahya Sinwar.

A relative carries the shrouded body of 10-year-old Sama al-Debs, who was killed during an Israeli army operation in the Jabalia refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip, ahead of her funeral on October 18. Picture: Omar Al-Qattaa / AFP

Israel conducted raids on Gaza Friday local time, pressing its year-long war to crush Hamas after dealing it a massive blow with the killing of its leader, Yahya Sinwar.

Hailing the killing of Sinwar, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the war sparked by Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack was not over, but added that it was “the beginning of the end”.

He called the death of Sinwar, mastermind of the deadliest attack in Israeli history, an “important landmark in the decline of the evil rule of Hamas”.

But his death did not spell an end to Israel’s air strikes on Gaza, with several raids early Friday pummelling the territory, according to an AFP journalist on the ground.

Gaza’s civil defence agency said an Israeli strike near Jabalia in the territory’s north killed 33 people at a refugee camp overnight from Friday to Saturday.

Agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal announced “33 deaths and dozens of wounded”, while a medical source at the Al-Awda hospital said it had registered 22 dead and 70 wounded after the strike on the Tal al-Zaatar camp for Palestinian refugees.

Hamas’s October 7 attack resulted in the deaths of 1206 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP tally of official Israeli figures that includes hostages killed in captivity.

Militants also took 251 people hostage during the attack. Ninety-seven remain in Gaza, including 34 who Israeli officials say are dead.

Yahya Sinwar (C) shouting slogans as he took part in a tent city protest near the border with Israel east of Jabalia in 2018. Picture: Mohammed Abed / AFP

Chief of Hamas in Gaza at the time of the attack, Sinwar had become the militant group’s overall leader after the killing in July of its political chief, Ismail Haniyeh.

US President Joe Biden, whose government is Israel’s top arms provider, said of Sinwar’s death: “This is a good day for Israel, for the United States, and for the world.”

“There is now the opportunity for a ‘day after’ in Gaza without Hamas in power, and for a political settlement that provides a better future for Israelis and Palestinians alike.”

With the civilian toll in Gaza mounting, Israel has faced criticism over its conduct of the war, including from the US.

According to reports in Israeli media, Netanyahu has ordered an increase of humanitarian aid into Gaza of up to 250 trucks a day.

A UN-backed assessment has found some 345,000 Gazans face “catastrophic” levels of hunger this winter.

Israel’s campaign to crush Hamas and bring back the hostages seized by militants has killed 42,438 people in Gaza, the majority civilians, according to data from the health ministry in the Hamas-run territory, figures which the UN considers reliable.

Israeli military chief Herzi Halevi vowed to keep fighting “until we capture all the terrorists involved in the October 7 massacre and bring all the hostages home”.