Hamas says Israel killing commander threatens ceasefire

Israel's assassination of a senior Hamas commander threatens the viability of the Gaza ceasefire, the chief negotiator of the militant group has said, calling on US President Donald Trump to demand Israel comply with the terms of the truce.

Thousands of Hamas supporters rallied in central Gaza City at a funeral for senior commander Raed Saed and three associates killed alongside him yesterday.

The mourners chanted "Martyrs are dear to God" and carried the bodies in coffins draped in green Hamas flags, in one of the group's biggest displays of its presence since a US-backed ceasefire deal came into effect in Gaza in October.

In a televised address, Hamas chief negotiator Khalil al-Hayya, who lives in exile, confirmed the killing of Saed, the highest-profile assassination of a senior Hamas figure since the truce.

"The continued Israeli violations of the ceasefire agreement ... and latest assassinations that targeted Saed and others threaten the viability of the agreement," Mr Hayya said.

"We call on mediators, and especially the main guarantor, the US administration and President Donald Trump, to work on obliging Israel to respect the ceasefire and commit to it," he said.

The Hamas armed wing said later it had chosen a replacement for Saed, who it said had been in charge of "military manufacturing." His assassination would not deter the group from pursuing the "path of Jihad", it said.

Hamas sources have described Saed as the second-in-command of the group's armed wing, after Izzeldeen Al-Hadad.

Israel says Saed was one of the key architects of the 7 October 2023 attack on Israel that triggered the war.

Hamas has not identified an overall chief since Israel killed the group's head Yehya Al-Sinwar in 2024.

Instead, the group has since been led by a five-man high leadership council, of which Mr Hayya is a member.

Since the ceasefire, Israeli forces have remained in control of the depopulated eastern half of Gaza, while the militant group has reasserted its control over the western half, where nearly all of the enclave's more than 2 million people live in the ruins.

The warring sides have yet to agree on the next steps. Israel demands that Hamas disarm and be barred from any future administration of Gaza.

Hamas says it will not give up its arms and wants Israeli forces to withdraw fully.

The agreement calls for a UN-authorised International Stabilisation Force to help keep peace.

Mr Hayya, the Hamas negotiator, said theforce should be restricted to Gaza's border, outside the territory.

The US Central Command, which oversees US military forces in the Middle East, will host a conference in Doha on 16 December with partner nations to plan the International Stabilisation Force for Gaza, US officials told Reuters.

In the Central Gaza, gunmen shot dead Ahmed Zamzam, a senior officer in a Hamas-run internal security service tasked with fighting collaboration with Israel.

The Gaza Interior Ministry described the attackers as "collaborators acting upon Israeli orders" and said one suspect was detained.

Ghassan Duhine, the leader of an anti-Hamas group, the Popular Forces, based in the Israeli-occupied sector of Gaza, said his group had killed Zamzam in "a fair revenge".

Hamas brands Duhine's group and others that operate in areas Israel still occupies as collaborators. The groups deny this and blame Hamas for bringing about Gaza's destruction.

Reuters could not independently verify the circumstances of the attack on Zamzam. The Israeli military did not comment.