By NIDAL AL-MUGHRABI and MAAYAN LUBELL Reuters
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CAIRO/JERUSALEM — An Israeli airstrike at a hospital in Gaza on Sunday killed five people, including a Hamas political leader, Palestinian medics and Hamas said, in an attack Israel said had targeted a key figure in the militant group.

The Gaza Health Ministry said the strike hit the surgery department at Nasser Hospital in Khan Younis. The Israeli military said its attack followed extensive intelligence and used precise munitions to minimize harm at the site.

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Hamas said a member of its political office, Ismail Barhoum, had been killed.

Israel’s defence minister, Israel Katz, confirmed the target was Barhoum. The military did not name the target, which it described only as “a key terrorist” in Hamas.

Hamas’ Al-Aqsa TV said Barhoum was being treated at the hospital for wounds sustained in a previous attack. Israel says Hamas systematically embeds in hospitals, schools and shelters, which the group denies.

Video on social media showed a fire blazing on the third storey of what appeared to be the hospital. Reuters could not immediately verify the footage.

After two months of relative calm in the war, Gazans have again been fleeing for their lives after Israel effectively abandoned a ceasefire, launching a new all-out air and ground campaign on Tuesday against Hamas.

Another leader in Hamas, Salah al-Bardaweel, was killed in a separate strike in Khan Younis, Hamas said earlier. The Israeli military confirmed it had killed Bardaweel on Saturday.

Both Bardaweel and Barhoum were members of the 19-member Hamas decision-making body, the political office, 11 of whom have been killed since the start of the war in late 2023, according to Hamas sources.

Explosions echoed throughout the north, central and southern Gaza Strip early on Sunday, as Israeli planes hit targets in those areas in what witnesses said was an escalation of the attacks that began earlier in the week.

Signalling it could escalate its actions further, the Israeli military said on Sunday one of its divisions that had operated in Lebanon, where Israel fought Hamas’ Iranian-backed ally Hezbollah, was preparing for possible action in Gaza.

It distributed video of tanks unloaded in a field and a caption that read: “Preparations of the 36th Division for Operations in the Gaza Strip.”

At least 45 Palestinians had been killed in Israeli strikes on Rafah and Khan Younis so far on Sunday, health authorities said.

Palestinian officials on Sunday put the death toll from nearly 18 months of conflict at over 50,000.