Palestinian Death Toll Rises as Israeli Occupation Forces Continue Attacks in Gaza Also Hitting House of Hamas Political Chief Yahya Sinwar

Image: The Guardian

Faizel Patel – 16/05/2021

As Israel’s bombardment of the Gaza Strip entered its seventh consecutive day, the Gaza Health Ministry says at least 174 Palestinians, including 47 children that have been killed in the past week.

The ministry says some 1,200 others were also wounded as a result of the ongoing Israeli airstrikes on the Gaza Strip.

It says the number of dead and wounded is expected to rise with the Ministry of Health’s emergency response teams still working to extract trapped people and dead bodies from under the rubble.

Meanwhile, it has merged that Israeli air strikes have hit the home of Yahya Sinwar, head of Hamas’ political wing in the Gaza Strip, but it is unclear if he was killed.

It is believed that Sinwar’s brother, Muhammad Sinwar, Head of Logistics and Manpower for Hamas was also attacked by Israeli occupation forces.

Witnesses confirmed to AFP a strike had hit Sinwar’s house.

Sinwar, a former commander of Hamas’s military branch, served more than two decades in an Israeli jail before he was released in 2011 as a part of a prisoner exchange.

First elected as the head of Hamas’s political wing in Gaza in 2017, he was re-elected in March, extending his tenure as the Islamist movement’s de facto leader in the Israeli-blockaded Palestinian enclave.

Hamas overall chief Ismail Haniyeh is currently based in Qatar.

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