The Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) continued to destroy terrorist infrastructure and eliminate Hamas leadership as the ground operation in Gaza entered its fifth day.
“Hundreds of Hamas military targets were destroyed and many terrorists have been killed by the IDF over the past 24 hours, the IDF announced on Tuesday morning,” the Jerusalem Post reported. “Some 300 targets were attacked, including anti-tank missile and rocket-launching positions, Hamas tunnels, and military installations, the IDF Spokesperson’s Unit announced.”
The advancing Israeli forces were taking fire from Hamas terrorists hiding in residential neighborhoods and vast network of underground tunnels. “During the forces’ ground operations, the soldiers had several engagements with terrorist cells that fired both anti-tank missiles and machine gun fire toward them. The soldiers killed terrorists and directed air forces to real-time strikes on targets and terror infrastructure,” the IDF said in a statement revealing the details of the overnight operations.
As Israeli infantry and armor fan out into terrorist-controlled Gaza, the head of IDF Southern Command, who is overseeing the military operation, told his troops that the eyes of the “entire nation of Israel” were on them as they prepare for take on the “abominable enemy” on his own turf.
“We are striking Hamas and the terrorist organizations in the Gaza Strip. We have one goal – victory. No matter how long or how hard the fighting will be, there is no other outcome than victory,” Commander of the IDF’s Southern Command, Major General Finkelman, told the soldiers over the Army Radio. “We will fight in alleys, we will fight in tunnels, we will fight wherever necessary. We will eliminate the abominable enemy before whom we stand.”
An Israeli airstrike killed one of the leading perpetrators of the October 7 massacre, Nasim Abu Ajina, the IDF disclosed Tuesday morning. Hamas murdered 1,400 Israelis and took at least 240 hostages, among them women, children, and the elderly, in a shock terrorist attack three weeks ago.
“IDF fighter jets struck the Beit Lahia Battalion Commander of Hamas’ Northern Brigade, Nasim Abu Ajina, who directed the massacre on October 7 in the Kibbutz Erez and Moshav Netiv HaAsara,” the Israeli TV channel i24News reported Tuesday. “In the past, Abu Ajina commanded Hamas’ aerial forces, taking an active part in the development the terrorist organization’s UAVs and paragliders, which were a central part in the October 7 attack.”
Ajina was also a key player in organizing Hamas terrorist activities against Israeli ground forces entering Gaza. “His elimination significantly harms the efforts of the Hamas terrorist organization to disrupt the IDF’s ground activities,” the IDF confirmed in a statement.
The news comes nearly a week after Israel’s security agency, Shin Bet, set up a special unit to track down and eliminate every single Hamas terrorist who took part in the October 7 attack. The operation, assisted by Mossad, has already succeeded in taking out some of the senior Hamas figures behind the shock terror attack, Israeli news reports indicate.
While Hamas plans to maximize civilian casualties, the IDF renewed its efforts to inform the Gaza residents to leave the northern part of the territory designated as the battle zone.
Hamas has set up roadblocks to prevent Gazans from fleeing the combat zone. There are even documented reports of terrorist groups firing at civilians trying to flee for safety.
Despite recent losses, Iran-sponsored Lebanese terrorist group Hezbollah continues to attack Israel from the north. The terror militia, which controls large parts of Lebanon and Syria along Israel’s northern border, is apparently trying to tie Israeli troops as the Gaza ground operation rolls on.
So far, the IDF has successfully repelled Hezbollah’s attempt to breach the border. The Lebanon-based terrorist militia, which sits on a huge Iran-supplied rocket stockpile, has stepped up missile fire toward towns and cities in northern Israel.
Reuters news agency reported Tuesday:
With dozens of Hezbollah fighters killed in three weeks of border clashes with Israel, the Lebanese group is working to stem its losses as it prepares for the possibility of a drawn-out conflict, three sources familiar with its thinking said.The Iran-backed group has lost 47 fighters to Israeli strikes at Lebanon’s frontier since its Palestinian ally Hamas and Israel went to war on Oct. 7 – about a fifth of the number killed in a full-scale war between Hezbollah and Israel in 2006. (…)One of the sources familiar with Hezbollah’s thinking told Reuters that the use of anti-aircraft missiles was one of several steps taken by the Shi’ite Muslim group to curb its losses and counter Israeli drones, which have picked off its fighters in the rocky terrain and olive groves along the border.
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