A senior Palestinian terror operative was killed in an Israeli operation in the southern Gaza Strip early Monday morning, Palestinian media reported, as the Israel Defense Forces denied that the effort was an attempt to rescue Israeli hostages.
Media outlets in Gaza reported that Israeli special forces entered Khan Younis and killed Ahmad Sarhan, a senior member of the military wing of the Popular Resistance Committees.
According to the reports, the force entered the heart of the Palestinian city in disguise, including some troops dressed as women. During the operation, Sarhan’s wife and children were apprehended, the reports claimed.
The Popular Resistance Committees is considered the third-largest terror organization operating in the Gaza Strip, after Hamas and Islamic Jihad. In recent years, the group has operated under Hamas’s directives.
Amid the incident at dawn, a wave of heavy airstrikes was reported around the Khan Younis area, including Nasser Hospital.
Videos from the Strip showed large strikes in quick succession in the area, followed by the sounds of helicopter gunships, shelling, small arms fire, and other explosions. There were unconfirmed Palestinian media reports of casualties.
Initially, a report from Saudi news channel al-Arabiya, picked up by Hebrew-language media, claimed that the Israeli forces entered the area as part of an attempted hostage rescue operation.
In response, the IDF issued a vague statement hinting that no such operation took place.
“The IDF is in the midst of Operation Gideon’s Chariots and is operating in all areas of the Gaza Strip,” the military said, referring to its intensified offensive launched late last week.
“Following the reports, there is no change to the situational assessment,” the statement added.
The special forces exited the city without taking on any casualties, according to Hebrew-language media.
Palestinian media published images purportedly showing a wagon left behind by the Israeli forces.
The photos showed what appeared to be a wagon of the kind usually pulled by a mule or motorcycle, and often used by displaced Gazans to move their belongings. Inside, however, was a secret hollow section where Israeli troops or equipment may have been hidden, or which possibly could be used to hold suspects.
Meanwhile, Palestinian media outlets reported Monday that dozens of aerial bombardments were conducted across the Gaza Strip overnight.
Strikes were reported in and near Khan Younis in southern Gaza, in Gaza City in the north, and in the area of Deir al-Balah in the central Strip.
Gazan media sources linked to the Strip’s Hamas rulers claimed 17 people were killed across the Strip since early Monday morning, citing health authorities in the enclave. Gazan health authorities do not differentiate between civilians and combatants, and their figures cannot be verified.
There was no immediate confirmation or comment from the IDF, which on Sunday launched an expanded offensive against Hamas in Gaza, dubbed “Operation Gideon’s Chariots.”
IDF spokesman Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin said in a press statement from the Gaza border on Sunday evening that five divisions were now operating inside the Strip.
“We are entering a new stage in the fighting. During the operation, we will increase and expand our operational control in Gaza while bisecting the Strip and moving the population for its safety in all the areas where we operate,” he said. “Unlike before, we are now focusing on the offensive effort in the Gaza Strip…until the defeat [of Hamas] in the areas where we operate.”
Israeli officials had warned that the major offensive would be launched if no hostage deal was reached with Hamas by the end of US President Donald Trump’s visit to the region on Friday.
Hostage talks were still ongoing, and the military said it was only carrying out the preliminary stages of the offensive. IDF Chief of Staff Lt. Gen. Eyal Zamir said, “The IDF will allow flexibility for the political echelon to advance any hostage deal.”
“A hostage deal — this is not a halt; it is an achievement,” Zamir stressed during a visit to Gaza on Sunday. “We are working toward it.”
According to Israeli officials, the offensive would see the IDF “conquer” Gaza, raze the vast majority of buildings and retain the territory for the foreseeable future; attack Hamas and prevent it from taking control of humanitarian aid supplies; and move Palestinians from Gaza’s north to its south.
Hundreds of Gazans have been killed in Israeli strikes since the initial stages of the operation were launched on Friday, according to Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry, which says more than 53,000 people in the Strip have been killed or are presumed dead in the war so far.
The tolls cannot be verified and do not differentiate between civilians and fighters. Israel has said it seeks to minimize civilian fatalities and stresses that Hamas uses Gaza’s civilians as human shields, fighting from civilian areas, including homes, hospitals, schools and mosques.
Israel says it has killed some 20,000 combatants in battle as of January, and another 1,600 terrorists inside the country during the October 7 onslaught, when thousands of Hamas-led terrorists killed some 1,200 people and took 251 hostages.