Israel said on Saturday that an airstrike in Gaza had killed Izz al-Din al-Haddad, the head of Hamas’s military wing, whom it described as one of the principal architects of the October 7, 2023 attacks that triggered the war.
The Israeli military said al-Haddad was killed on Friday and had directed the planning and execution of the 2023 assault on southern Israel, in which around 1,200 people were killed and more than 250 taken hostage. Hamas confirmed his death.
Israel said al-Haddad had taken over as Hamas’s top military commander after the killing of his predecessor, Mohammed Sinwar. His death removes the most senior figure in the group’s armed wing, the Qassam Brigades.
Six other people were killed in the strike, including al-Haddad’s wife and daughter, according to the Israeli account. Casualty details from individual strikes in Gaza have frequently been disputed during the war.
Al-Haddad joined Hamas around the time of its founding in the late 1980s and rose through the Qassam Brigades, Israeli officials said. He sat on the group’s military council, the senior body of commanders that planned the October 7 operation.
The killing of successive Hamas military leaders has been a central Israeli objective throughout the conflict, though it has not ended the fighting or secured the release of the remaining hostages.
The strike came as a separate, fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah in Lebanon was extended for a further 45 days, even as Israeli forces continued operations there. Gaza and Lebanon have remained the two principal fronts of a regional conflict now in its third year.