Who Was Abdel-Aziz Salha? Hamas Militant Killed By Israel, Once Jailed For Role In West Bank Lynchings

Israel has killed Abdel-Aziz Salha, a West Bank Hamas militant who had been jailed for life for taking part in the lynching of two Israeli reservists in Ramallah in 2000 but later deported to Gaza in a prisoner swap, Hamas media and medics said.

Salha was killed in an Israeli airstrike on a tent inside Al-Aklouk School, which shelters displaced Palestinians, in Deir Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip earlier on Thursday, medics said. There was no immediate Israeli comment on Salha’s death or whether he had been deliberately targeted.

Who Was Abdel-Aziz Salha?

The 2000 incident took place in Ramallah in the West Bank, where the reservists were seized at a Palestinian checkpoint, brought to a police station and set upon by a mob that choked and beat them to death. It followed the funeral of a 17-year-old Palestinian killed by Israeli fire, and two weeks during which several other Palestinians were killed across the West Bank.

Salha was arrested by Israel in 2001 and sentenced to a lifetime in prison. He was freed along with more than 1,000 other Palestinians in an October 2011 swap with Hamas for Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who had spent five years in captivity in Gaza. Separately on Thursday, the Israeli military announced it had killed three senior Hamas officials in an airstrike that targeted them in Gaza three months ago.

Other Senior Hamas officials killed

It identified the three men as Rawhi Mushtaha, a confidant of Hamas Gaza chief Yehya Al-Sinwar, Sameh Al-Saraj, a senior security official and Sami Odeh, Hamas’ general security service commander. “Mushtaha was involved in military decisions while also acting as the Head of Hamas Civil Governance in the Gaza Strip and holding the Prisoners Affairs Portfolio. He also formerly held the finance portfolio,” the military said. There was no immediate comment from Hamas.

Earlier on Thursday, an Israeli airstrike in Gaza City killed five Palestinians, while another airstrike on Nuseirat killed one man and wounded several others, medics said. Palestinian health officials said Israeli strikes had so far killed at least 12 people across the enclave on Thursday. Earlier, the Gaza health ministry said Israeli military strikes had killed 99 Palestinians across the territory in the previous 24 hours.

First anniversary of the war

Palestinians in the Gaza Strip will mark the first anniversary of the war next week, with little hope of an end soon to the fighting, as Israel begins a separate ground offensive in Lebanon against Hamas’s Iranian-backed ally Hezbollah. Hezbollah has been firing rockets into Israel in support of Hamas in the war in Gaza, which started after Hamas-led militants stormed through Israeli towns on Oct. 7 last year.

Israel says 1,200 people were killed and more than 250 taken hostage in that attack, triggering the war that has devastated Gaza, displacing most of its 2.3 million population and killing more than 41,700 people, according to Gaza health authorities.

(This story has not been edited by News18 staff and is published from a syndicated news agency feed – Reuters)