The Israeli army announced that it had killed Hassan al-Atrash, who was responsible for supplying and producing weapons for Hamas as well as smuggling weapons from various countries to the Gaza Strip and the West Bank. According to reports from the Tel Aviv Defense Forces, Al-Atrash was killed yesterday in an airstrike in the southern Gaza Strip in Rafah, of which they released a video. Meanwhile, the armed wing of the Islamist political and paramilitary organization said it believed five Israeli hostages held in the Gaza Strip had died. According to al-Qassam Brigades spokesman Abu Obeida, “as a result of a barbaric” Israeli bombing, “contact was lost with a group responsible for five prisoners, Israeli hostages,” who died, according to a Palestinian website the prisoners “in one of those Israeli attacks in Gaza.” Hamas has identified three of the hostages: “Haim Perry, Yoram Metzger and Amiram Cooper,” aged between 80 and 84, who appeared in the video released by the group last Monday.
