In an early morning Israeli airstrike on Tuesday on eastern parts of the Gaza strip, two Palestinians were martyred, among them a senior commander for the Palestinian Islamic Jihad Movement, and three others were wounded.

Iran PressMiddle East: The Zionist regime has martyred a senior commander of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad movement in an airstrike in the Gaza Strip, sparking a barrage of retaliatory rocket fire from the besieged enclave into the occupied territories.

"Abu al-Ata" was a senior commander of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad in the Gaza Strip.

Israeli drones were flying over Gaza following the assassination.

The assassination is likely to fuel tensions between Tel Aviv and Gaza, which has been under a total blockade by Israel since 2007 and witnessed three wars since 2008.

Meanwhile the Palestinian resistance group, Islamic Jihad Movement, stressed that its commander was heroically defending the Palestinian land against conspiracies prior to his martyrdom.

Separately, the Hamas resistance movement said Israel bears full responsibility for all consequences of this escalation, and pledged that al-Ata’s death 'will not go unpunished'. 207/211/209

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