“* Israeli strike kills son of Gaza Hamas chief * Hamas says attack aims to win political concession * Israeli fire kills three police officers, medics say By Nidal al-Mughrabi and Dawoud Abu Alkas An Israeli airstrike has killed the son of Hamas' chief negotiator in U.S.-mediated talks over Gaza's future, a senior Hamas official said on Thursday, as leaders of the militant group held talks in Cairo aimed at safeguarding their truce with Israel. Azzam Al-Hayya, son of Khalil Al-Hayya, succumbed to his wounds on Thursday after being struck in an Israeli attack on Wednesday night, senior Hamas official Basim Naim said. He is the fourth son of Hamas' exiled Gaza chief to have been killed in Israeli attacks. The Israeli military did not respond to a request for comment. Later on Thursday, health officials and the Hamas-run interior ministry said at least three police officers were killed, and other people, including one policeman, were wounded when an Israeli airstrike targeted a police post in western Gaza City. There was no immediate comment from the Israeli military. Reuters has reported that Israel has intensified its attacks on Gaza's Hamas-run police force, which the militant group has used to reinforce its hold in the areas it controls in the strip. PAST ISRAELI STRIKES HAVE KILLED THREE MORE OF HIS SONS Hayya, who has seven children, has survived multiple Israeli attempts to kill him. An Israeli strike in Doha last year targeting Hamas leadership killed another son, though Hayya survived. Two other sons were killed in past Israeli attempts on his life, in Gaza strikes in 2008 and 2014. Speaking to Al Jazeera after the attack on Wednesday night, before his son's death was announced, Hayya accused Israel of trying to undermine mediators' efforts to push ahead with U.S. President Donald Trump's Gaza plan, overseen by his so-called 'Board of Peace. 'These Zionist attacks and violations clearly indicate that the occupation does not want to abide by a ceasefire or by the first phase,' Hayya said. Chanting 'Allahu akbar', or 'God is Greatest', dozens of Palestinians rallied in Gaza at the funeral of Hayya, the son, and held special prayers before walking him to burial. Women relatives paid respects to the white-shrouded body. 'Your martyrdom, my beloved brother, you and my brother Hammam, and Osama and Hamza, will not deter my father, Dr. Khalil Al-Hayya, from this principle, nor from these constants,' the victim's sister said inside the morgue. The group's Gaza spokesperson, Hazem Qassem, said the killing of the Hamas leader's son was a failed attempt by Israel to influence the negotiating team and win political concessions. 'We say that this repeated policy of targeting the leaders and the sons of leaders will not succeed in extorting a political position from our Palestinian people, nor the Hamas leadership, nor its negotiating delegation,' Qassem told Reuters. HAMAS DISARMAMENT A STICKING POINT IN TALKS The violence comes as leaders of Hamas and other Palestinian factions held talks with regional mediators and the Board of Peace’s lead envoy, Nickolay Mladenov, this week in Cairo, to push Trump's Gaza plan into its second phase, officials said. Trump's Gaza plan, which Israel and Hamas agreed to in October, involves Israeli troops withdrawing from Gaza and reconstruction starting as Hamas lays down its weapons. But Hamas' disarmament is a sticking point in talks to implement the plan and cement an October ceasefire that halted two years of full-blown war. A Hamas official told Reuters on Wednesday the group told Mladenov it would not engage in serious talks over the implementation of the second phase before Israel concluded obligations stemming from the first phase of the Gaza deal, including a complete halt to attacks. At least 830 Palestinians have been killed since the ceasefire deal took effect, according to local medics, while Israel says militants have killed four of its soldiers over the same period. Israel says its strikes are aimed at thwarting attempts by Hamas and other Palestinian militants to stage attacks against its forces. (Reporting by Nidal al-Mughrabi in Cairo and Dawoud Abu Alkas in Gaza; Editing by Alexandra Hudson, Alex Richardson and Andrew Heavens) Gaza City, Palestinian Territories, May 7, 2026 (AFP) -A Gaza hospital and Hamas on Thursday said the son of the Palestinian Islamist movement's chief negotiator had died from wounds sustained in an Israeli strike a day earlier. Azzam Khalil al-Hayya, 23, the son of top Hamas official Khalil al-Hayya, 'was martyred after succumbing to wounds sustained in an Israeli airstrike targeting him yesterday,' Gaza City's Al-Shifa hospital said in a statement. The city's Al-Ahli hospital and a security source said on Wednesday that a strike on the Al-Daraj neighbourhood of Gaza City in the evening killed one person and wounded 10 others, including Azzam Khalil al-Hayya. The Israeli military did not immediately respond to AFP's request for comment on the incident. Azzam Khalil al-Hayya is the fourth of Khalil al-Hayya's seven sons to be killed in Israeli attacks, according to a Hamas source. Two of those were killed before the Gaza war erupted in October 2023. The third, Hammam, was killed in an Israeli strike targeting Hamas leaders in Doha in September, which killed six people. Khalil al-Hayya is the head of Hamas in Gaza despite living in exile in Qatar. He is currently vying for the leadership of the movement. He survived the strike on Doha. In a statement, Hamas said that the killing of Azzam Khalil al-Hayya 'came within the framework of attempts to exert pressure on the resistance leadership and its negotiating delegation, after the occupation's failure to impose its conditions or achieve its declared objectives.' The US-brokered ceasefire which came into effect in October has largely halted the Gaza war that began after Hamas's October 7, 2023 attack on Israel. But Gaza remains gripped by daily violence as Israeli strikes continue, with both the military and Hamas accusing one another of violating the truce. At least 846 Palestinians have been killed since the truce began, according to Gaza's health ministry, which operates under Hamas authority and whose figures are considered reliable by the United Nations. Over the same period, the Israeli military said five soldiers have been killed in Gaza. my-acc/ser
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