Maqadmeh was one of Hamas' founders

GAZA CITY, March 8 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – Exploiting world preoccupation with mounting Anglo-American war threats to Iraq, Israeli occupation forces Saturday, March 8, assassinated five Palestinians, including a senior Hamas leader, and wounded several others.

The Palestinian martyrs were killed by rockets fired from two Israeli helicopter gun ships on buildings in Gaza City, Agence France-Presse (AFP) quoted Palestinian security officials as saying.

The chief of security for the Islamic resistance movement Hamas Ibrahim Maqadmeh and three of his bodyguards were killed when helicopter gun ships fired several rockets on their car.

Eyewitnesses said the car had been completely torn apart by the blast and that charred body parts were scattered on the ground.

“Two helicopter missiles were fired at the car and two at the ground. I saw limbs and pieces of head flying off," AFP quoted Abdullah Aleh, 55, as saying.

"A man was badly injured in the head and chest in a car just behind that of Maqadmeh's," he said, referring to the Hamas chief's fourth bodyguard.

"The car was on fire and people were trying to put it out. The sight was really awful with small chopped body parts everywhere, it was a massacre in the real sense of the word," said Palestinian fire-fighter Abu Eyad.

Body parts from the wreck of the car shelled by Israeli helicopters

Israel acknowledged killing Maqadmeh, who, according to Israeli military sources said "was one of Hamas' founders and one of its military wing's leaders.”

In the northern Gaza Strip city of Beit Lahia, an unarmed 23-year-old Palestinian man was killed by Israeli fire.

The man was identified as Mufid al-Daifeh, from the adjacent town of Jabalya, and Palestinian security sources said youths were throwing stones at Israeli armor and bulldozers at the time of the incident.

The Ezzedine Al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas military wing, vowed to avenge Maqadmeh, saying "the priority is to target Zionist (Israeli) political leaders," in a statement released a few hours after the strike and endorsed by the group's political leadership.

"All military options are open, and the priority is to target Zionist (Israeli) political leaders," read the statement.

The Brigades urged "all its cells in Hebron, Nablus, Jenin, Ramallah, Bethlehem (in the West Bank) and in Gaza City, Rafah, Khan Yunis and Jabalya (in the Gaza Strip) to strike the occupation in its vital parts and ... target the Jewish political leaders."