Israel Kills Hamas's Northern Gaza Commander Izz al-Din al-Bik in a Gaza City Airstrike
He is the third Hamas brigade commander killed in about three weeks, despite an October 2025 ceasefire. A woman in the building also died, Palestinian medics said.
Israel killed Izz al-Din al-Bik, the commander of Hamas's Northern Gaza Brigade, in an overnight airstrike on an apartment in Gaza City early Tuesday, the Israeli military said.
The strike hit the al-Nasr neighborhood. The Israel Defense Forces said Bik "posed an immediate threat to IDF troops and Israeli civilians" and was responsible for managing the activities of the brigade's operatives. Palestinian medics said a woman was killed in the strike and that her husband and others were wounded. A second strike near a medical clinic at the Jabaliya refugee camp killed another person, according to reports from Gaza.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz announced the killing after the Palestinian reports emerged. "He was involved in planning terrorist attacks against our forces and worked to recruit terrorists," they said in a joint statement, adding that Israel would continue to hunt and pursue all of the organization's operatives "until there is no Hamas in Gaza."
Bik was born in 1981 and raised in the Jabaliya refugee camp, according to Ynet. He joined the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas's military wing, in 2000. He served as the brigade's intelligence chief before taking command of the northern sector after Ahmed Ghandour was killed in November 2023. Hamas confirmed that Bik took part in the Oct. 7, 2023 attack on Israel.
Bik had survived a previous attempt on his life. In May, Israel struck a target in which he was reportedly present alongside Imad Aslim, the deputy commander of Hamas's Gaza City Brigade. Aslim was killed in that strike, and Bik was not reported dead at the time.
Bik is the third Hamas brigade commander killed in recent weeks. The commander of the Khan Younis Brigade was killed on Sept. 11, and the commander of the Rafah Brigade on Sept. 15. The pace points to an Israeli campaign to dismantle the group's regional command structure in Gaza even as a ceasefire nominally remains in place.
That ceasefire, a U.S.-backed agreement reached in October 2025, stopped major fighting in the territory. Israel has continued targeted strikes since then, saying they are necessary to prevent attacks on its troops and civilians. Palestinians and aid groups have said such strikes keep civilians at risk, and Tuesday's death of a woman in the targeted building fits that pattern.
The killing came on a day of separate tension in the region. More than 100 Israeli settlers rioted in the West Bank village of Jalud on Monday night, blocking a displaced Palestinian family from returning to its home despite a court order, and Netanyahu condemned the attacks and called for prosecutions. The Senate also voted 47-51 against a measure that would have required the Trump administration to report on West Bank violence.
