https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-65529490








    Published

5 hours ago






At least 15 Palestinians, including three commanders of the militant group Islamic Jihad, have been killed in Israeli air strikes on the Gaza Strip.

Palestinian health officials said eight women and children were among the dead. Another 22 people were injured.

Israel said the Islamic Jihad leaders it targeted overnight were involved in recent attacks on Israeli civilians.

Islamic Jihad has vowed revenge and Gaza-based militants are expected to respond with rocket fire into Israel.

The extent of any escalation is likely to depend on whether Hamas, which controls Gaza, decides to join in.

Israel's Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, said the country was "prepared for all possibilities", adding: "I suggest that our enemies not test us."

The strikes were the deadliest since three days of hostilities between Israel and Islamic Jihad last August, in which 49 Palestinians were killed in Gaza.




The Israeli strikes began in the early hours of Tuesday morning,
when 40 warplanes and helicopters attacked in several waves across Gaza,
hitting homes and causing panic among residents.

Pictures showed at least two apartments with their fronts ripped away and others damaged.

The Gaza health ministry said four children and four women were among those killed. Half of the injured were women and children and several were in a critical condition in hospital, it added.

Russia announced that one of its citizens, Dr Jamal Khaswan, a former chairman of the Gaza Dentists' Association, was killed along with his wife Mervat and their 21-year-old son Youssef.

Another two of their children survived, it said. They included 10-year-old daughter Diala, who was filmed sitting in the front seat of an ambulance and crying out for her father.

Dr Wafai al-Sousi, a friend and colleague of Dr Khaswan, condemned what he called the "cowardly targeting" of the family.

"I was very surprised. He was just an incredible doctor... with a good reputation. He did not belong to any political party and never worked with any military entity," he told the BBC.

Palestinian sources said Dr Khaswan lived in an apartment in Gaza City close to one of the militants who was killed.

Islamic Jihad's military wing, the al-Quds Brigades, confirmed the deaths of three of its commanders, along with their wives and a number of their children. It identified them as:

    Jihad Shaker al-Ghannam, secretary of the al-Quds Brigades' Military Council
    Khalil Salah al-Bahtini, the commander of its Northern Region
    Tariq Mohammed Ezzedine, "one of the heads of military action" in the occupied West Bank

This will be a new war in the Middle East.

Is it the End Times?

3 of those countries are permanent members of the UN security council
and have veto powers:

USA, Russia and China.

As leaders in the world they should be leading
not covering up their crimes.
It will ultimately lead to WW3 just as
the former League of Nations was a toothless tiger in 1939.

issuevoter wrote on May 10^th, 2023 at 5:27pm:



I'm not a war crimes lawyer but it seems to me
that dropping a bomb on a building where you
know there are women and children is a war crime?
Correct me please.

Perhaps the Jihadis should stop hiding behind women and children.

freediver wrote on May 10^th, 2023 at 5:54pm:


Does that mean that both sides are war criminals?

Animals can never be 'monsters', like Humans can.

Bobby. wrote on May 10^th, 2023 at 9:03am:


There have been violence and bloodshed in the Middle East since time immemorial. Save your religious hysteria for something in the religion forum.