Israel kills senior militant commander in Gaza: military

JERUSALEM, May 17 — Israel assassinated on Monday a senior militant commander in the Gaza Strip, Israeli forces said, triggering a fresh barrage of rockets on Israeli cities.
Israel’s Shin Bet security service and the military said in a joint statement that warplanes struck and killed Hasam Abu Harbid, commander of the Northern Division of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, a militant group in Gaza that has been fighting alongside Hamas in the recent escalation.
Abu Harbid “has consistently led rocket launches against Israel, as well as shooting attacks at soldiers,” the statement read, adding he was behind an attack last Monday in which an Israeli civilian was injured.
He was a commander in the Islamic Jihad for over the past 15 years, according to the statement.
Shortly after the attack, a rocket barrage from Gaza was fired at southern Israel. One of the rockets hit a residential building in Ashdod city, causing damage and injuring three people, according to a statement by Israel’s Magen David Adom emergency health service.
According to a military notice on Monday, some 3,150 rockets have been fired from the Gaza Strip towards the Israeli territory. About 460 of these rockets failed to reach Israel and fell within the Gaza Strip. Israel’s Iron Dome Air Defense System has intercepted about 90 percent of the rockets, the army said.
At least 200 people in the besieged Palestinian enclave were killed, including 59 children. Meanwhile in Israel, 10 people were killed, including a five-year-old boy and a soldier. (Xinhua)