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Seven Palestinians killed, 50 injured in Israeli Gaza raid

BUREIJ, Gaza Strip, Feb 16 (AFP) - Seven Palestinians were killed and at least 50 wounded on Friday night when Israeli warplanes launched a raid on a building in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip, medics and witnesses said. The Israeli aircraft targeted the home of top Islamic Jihad militant Ayman al-Fayed in the Bureij Palestinian refugee camp south of Gaza City, killing him and two of his children, a boy and a girl, they said. A woman was among the other four dead, the medics said, adding that the fate of Fayed’s wife and three other children was not known. A military spokeswoman denied Israeli forces had attacked the house. Around 50 people, including around 20 children, were wounded when the building was hit by a missile, the Palestinian medics added. The Fayed house was completely destroyed in the attack and at least 10 other houses were damaged by the blast, witnesses and an AFP correspondent said. Medical sources identified Fayed, 42, as a top commander from the Al-Quds Brigades, the armed wing of Islamic Jihad. The group’s spokesman Abu Ahmad confirmed his death. The impoverished Gaza Strip is home to eight refugee camps, and Bureij is both the smallest and the most populated.

Source: dawn.com