TEL AVIV, May 4. /TASS/. The Israel Defense Forces said it eliminated one of the Islamic Jihad commanders in the town of Rafah in southern Gaza Strip.

According to the IDF, the commander, Ayman Zaarab, took part in the attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. He was eliminated by an airstrike on Saturday morning that was ordered on the basis of intelligence data. The airstrike also killed two other Islamic Jihad militants that were in the same room.

The situation in the Middle East sharply escalated following an incursion of Hamas militants from the Gaza Strip into Israel on October 7, accompanied by killings of residents of Israeli settlements near the border and taking more than 200 hostages, including children, women and elderly people. Hamas cast the attack as a response to Israeli actions against the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem. Israel declared a complete siege of the Gaza Strip and started striking the enclave and parts of Lebanon and Syria. Clashes are also taking place in the West Bank.