A senior Hamas commander who was one of the leaders of the October 7 massacre in southern Israel was killed, the Israel Defense Forces announced. Ibrahim Biari, the commander of Hamas' Central Jabaliya Battalion, was killed on Tuesday afternoon by IDF fighter jets, acting on intelligence provided by the Shin Bet.
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Biari was also responsible for sending the terrorists who carried out the 2004 terrorist attack in the Ashdod Port in which 13 Israelis were murdered, and was responsible for directing rocket fire at Israel, and advancing numerous attacks against the IDF, over the last two decades.
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Ibrahim Biari, the commander of Hamas' Central Jabaliya Battalion, was killed on Tuesday afternoon by IDF fighter jets
(Photo: IDF Spokesman's Unit)
Since IDF forces entered the Gaza Strip, Biari has directed all the Palestinian fighting in the northern Gaza Strip.
The assassinationn was carried out as part of a wide-scale strike on terrorists and terror infrastructure belonging to the Central Jabaliya Battalion, which had taken control over civilian buildings in Gaza City. "The strike damaged Hamas’ command and control in the area, as well as its ability to direct military activity against IDF soldiers operating throughout the Gaza Strip," the IDF said in a statement.
As a result of the strike, a large number of terrorists who were with Biari were killed, according to the IDF. Underground terror infrastructure embedded beneath the buildings, used by the terrorists, also collapsed after the strike, it noted.
Biari was killed in the same attack in which the Hamas Health Ministry in the Gaza Strip claimed earlier that at least 50 people had been killed; it later increased that number to an estimated 400 killed and injured, though search and rescue efforts had just begun. Biari was in the building that was attacked, and the IDF and the Shin Bet say that minutes before the bombing, a warning was sent to the occupants of the building to get out.
Jabaliya is a fairly crowded refugee camp, and apparently many residents have remained there despite the IDF's call for civilians to evacuate to the south of the Gaza Strip.
Meanwhile, the IDF spokesman announced that IDF forces under the command of the Givati Brigade took control of a Hamas military stronghold in Jabaliya in the northern Gaza Strip, and that in Tuesday's ground operations, approximately 50 terrorists were eliminated.
The captured stronghold is located in western Jabaliya and was used by the commander of Hamas’ Jabaliya Battalion for training and the execution of terror activities, according to the IDF. The area contains firing positions, terror tunnels used by terror operatives as a passageway to the coast, and a large stock of weapons used by the terrorists, the IDF said in a statement.
During the activity in the military stronghold, the soldiers killed a number of terrorists in the course of combat, and an IDF aircraft killed additional terrorists. The forces in the area destroyed entrances to terror tunnels, weapons, and military equipment. In addition, the soldiers located intelligence documents in the compound. At the end of the activity, the forces secured the compound, according to the IDF.
First published: 20:29, 10.31.23