IDF says Gaza strikes killed Islamic Jihad commander tied to October 7

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and the Israel Security Agency (ISA) say they have killed two Palestinian militants in separate strikes in the Gaza Strip this week. According to a joint announcement published by the IDF spokesperson, the first strike took place on Wednesday in the Khan Yunis area and killed Muhammad Abu Shalouf, whom the military describes as a company commander in the military wing of Islamic Jihad. The IDF says he crossed into Israeli territory during the October 7 attack.

A second strike followed on Friday, the military said. In a post on X, the IDF named the second man as Musa Atef Musa Abu Dan and identified him as a member of Hamas's Nukbah force. The military said both men had recently been advancing attacks against Israeli troops and working to rebuild the capabilities of their organisations, which it called a systematic breach of the ceasefire agreement. It said the strikes were carried out to remove the threat the two posed.

Who carried out the strikes

The IDF is Israel's military. The Israel Security Agency, known in Hebrew as the Shin Bet or Shabak, is the domestic security and intelligence service. The two bodies frequently issue joint statements on targeted strikes in Gaza, with the ISA typically contributing intelligence on the people targeted. Statements of this kind describe the military's account of who was killed and why; they are not court findings.

Islamic Jihad and the Nukbah force

Islamic Jihad, often referred to as Palestinian Islamic Jihad, is an armed group in Gaza that operates separately from Hamas, the movement that has governed the territory, although the two have frequently fought alongside each other. Like Hamas, it maintains a military wing organised into units, and a company commander would sit at a middle level of that structure.

Nukbah is the name of an elite Hamas unit. Israeli officials have described Nukbah fighters as central to the October 7 attack, and the IDF routinely uses the term when announcing strikes on Hamas members. In this announcement, the military did not say whether Abu Dan himself took part in the October 7 attack; that claim was made only about Abu Shalouf.

Where Khan Yunis is

Khan Yunis is a city in the southern Gaza Strip, between Deir al-Balah to the north and Rafah to the south. It saw heavy fighting during the war and has remained an area where Israeli forces report activity. The IDF placed the Wednesday strike in the Khan Yunis area. The available text of its announcement does not say where the Friday strike took place.

The October 7 attack and the ceasefire

On October 7, Hamas led a cross-border assault from Gaza into southern Israel, during which gunmen from several armed groups, including Islamic Jihad, entered Israeli communities and military posts. The attack triggered the war in Gaza. Israel has said it intends to pursue those who took part, and its military regularly highlights involvement in October 7 when it announces that an individual has been killed.

The IDF framed both strikes as responses to violations of the ceasefire agreement in force in Gaza. Under such arrangements, each side has accused the other of breaches, and Israel has continued to carry out strikes it says target militants preparing attacks or rearming. The military's statement presents these two killings in that context.

What the reports do not say

Both reports come from the Israeli military's own channels, a Telegram post from the IDF spokesperson and a post on the IDF's account on X. No independent organisation is represented in the material, and neither Islamic Jihad nor Hamas is quoted confirming or disputing the deaths or the descriptions of the two men.

The statements do not describe the specific attacks the men are said to have been planning, or give evidence for the claim that they were rebuilding their groups' capabilities. They do not say what kind of munition was used, whether anyone else was killed or injured in either strike, or the exact location of the Friday strike. The text of the spokesperson's announcement available to us is cut off partway through its description of the second strike, so further details it may contain are not reflected here. Nor do the reports address any response from the mediators or parties to the ceasefire agreement.