JERUSALEM

The Israeli army claimed on Friday the assassination of a senior member of the Islamic Jihad movement in a targeted airstrike last week in the area of Deir al-Balah in central Gaza Strip.

In a statement, the army said it carried out an airstrike last week on “Khaled Abu Daqa, the commander of the rocket unit in the Islamic Jihad movement."

In a separate statement, the army claimed killing five Hamas fighters in an airstrike on Beit Lahia in the northern Gaza Strip on Wednesday night.

Neither the Islamic Jihad nor Hamas movements immediately commented on the army's claims.

Israel has launched a genocidal war on the Gaza Strip following a cross-border attack by the Palestinian group Hamas in October last year, killing more than 44,000 people, most of them women and children, and injuring over 104,000.

The second year of genocide in Gaza has drawn growing international condemnation, with officials and institutions labeling the attacks and blocking of aid deliveries as a deliberate attempt to destroy a population.

The ICC announced in a landmark move on Thursday that it issued arrest warrants for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Gallant for war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

Israel also faces a genocide case at the International Court of Justice for its deadly war on Gaza.

*Writing by Ikram Kouachi