GAZA (Dispatches) -- The occupying regime of Israel’s military martyred 15 Palestinians, including three Palestinian Islamic Jihad (PIJ) commanders along with their wives and children, in an overnight attack on the Gaza Strip.
A total of 40 fighter jets participated in bombing different locations in the besieged enclave just after 2am local time on Tuesday, according to the Zionist military.
The Palestinian health ministry said at least four children, four women, a dentist and his family were among those martyred. Another 20 people were wounded, including three children and seven women, some of whom are in a serious and critical condition.
Three commanders in the Al-Quds Brigades, the military branch of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, were martyred along with their families in the bombardment.
They were identified by the PIJ as Jihad Ghannam, Al-Quds Brigades’s general secretary, Khalil al-Bahtini, a northern Gaza commander, and Tareq Izzeldeen, a military commander.
Two more Palestinians were martyred in a fresh Israeli airstrike in Khan Yunis later Tuesday.
The Gaza health ministry said the two men were killed in the attack on their vehicle.
The Zionist military claimed in a Twitter post that the strike had targeted a squad carrying anti-tank guided missiles in the city.
The Islamic Jihad is considered the second-largest resistance movement in the Gaza Strip behind Hamas, which governs the enclave.
The group said in a statement that a response to the Israeli aggression “will not take long”.
“The bombardment will be met by bombardment and the attack will be met by an attack,” said Islamic Jihad spokesperson Tareq Selmi. “This crime will not pass unpunished.”
Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh, who is based in Qatar, said: “Assassination of leaders will not bring the occupation security but more resistance.”
The Joint Operations Room (JOR), an umbrella body of armed factions in Gaza including Hamas and the Islamic Jihad, said in a statement that the occupying regime of Israel “will pay the price” for the attack.
Zionist war minister Yoav Gallant said that the military, working with the Shin Bet intelligence service, targeted the leadership of the Islamic Jihad in Gaza in a “precise” operation. Shortly after the airstrikes, the Israeli military acknowledged the attack.
In fear of reprisal attacks from Palestinian groups, occupied cities near the fence with Gaza opened public bomb shelters and dozens of families evacuated their homes, moving to other parts of the occupied territories.
Roads near Gaza and beaches in the southern cities of Ashkelon and Ashdod have been closed.
In a brief statement, the Palestinian health ministry mourned Israel’s killing of Jamal Khaswan, a well-known dentist and the chairman of Al-Wafa Hospital’s board of directors.
He was martyred with his wife, Merfat Khaswan, and their child, Yousef Khaswan.
“The Ministry of Health mourns with great sadness Dr Jamal Khaswan, who was martyred at dawn today, alongside his wife and son, as a result of the brutal Zionist attack on Gaza City,” the statement said.
“Dr Khaswan was a man of great patriotic and medical dedication.”
The UN Special Coordinator for the Middle East Peace Process Tor Wennesland condemned the “unacceptable” killing of civilians.
“I condemn the deaths of civilians in the Israeli airstrikes. This is unacceptable,” Wennesland said.
The attack comes a week after a brief exchange of fire between the occupying regime of Israel and Palestinian groups in Gaza left one Palestinian killed and two Israelis wounded.
It followed the death of prominent Palestinian hunger striker Khader Adnan, who was a member of the Islamic Jihad in the occupied West Bank.
The Tuesday airstrikes were the largest attack mounted by the Zionist regime against Gaza since August last year, when the military assassinated senior PIJ commander Taiseer al-Jabari, triggering a three-day exchange of fire.
At least 49 Palestinians were martyred in the 2022 Israeli bombardment, including 17 children, and 360 others were wounded.
More than two million Palestinians are packed into Gaza, one of the world’s most densely populated areas. Under blockade by Israel since 2006, the besieged coastal enclave has been described as “the world’s largest open-air prison”.
The occupying regime of Israel withdrew its troops from the strip in 2005 but maintains tight control of Gaza’s airspace, land and sea borders, which has reduced its economy to a state of collapse.
“There is no voice more sonorous than that of the resistance front,” Nablus-based