According to the official Palestinian news agency and the Hamas health ministry, a former minister of the Palestinian Authority was murdered on Sunday in an Israeli hit on his residence in the Gaza Strip.
According to the ministry and Wafa news agency, Youssef Salama, 68, a former minister of religious affairs in the Palestinian Authority, was murdered in an attack on the Al-Maghazi refugee camp in the central Gaza Strip.
Known for being loyal to Mahmud Abbas’s party, Fatah, the president of the Palestinian Authority, Salama held the position of minister from February 2005 until March 2006.
He also served as a preacher at Al-Aqsa mosque in the Old City of Jerusalem.
There was no immediate comment on his killing from the Israeli army.
Following the unprecedented attack on southern Israel by Palestinian terrorists on October 7, Israel began an unrelenting military campaign against Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
An AFP count based on Israeli data indicates that 1,140 people were killed in the jihadist attack, the most of them civilians.
The health ministry in Hamas-ruled Gaza reports that over 21,800 individuals have died as a result of Israel’s continuing offensive in Gaza, the majority of them were women and children.