A family in Gaza said on Friday it had executed a relative they said had helped Israel track down and eliminate three senior Hamas terrorists, including one of the man’s own clan.
In a statement, the family of Ahmed Barhoum said it had shot him in the city of Rafah after they were told by Hamas that he had provided information to Israel. This, the statement said, guided an Israeli air strike during the 2014 Protective Edge operation in Gaza that targeted the Hamas terrorists.
“In light of our religious and moral commitment we have executed the collaborator Ahmed Barhoum after he was handed over by the resistance factions,” the statement said.
The family said they had listened to their relative’s confession and saw the evidence against him. The Barhoums are one of Rafah’s largest clans of terrorists and well known for their closeness to Islamist terror groups.
Hamas, the Islamist terror group that dominates Gaza, issued a statement praising the Barhoum family’s action as illustrating “its nobleness and deep affiliation with the (anti-Israel) resistance (terrorism)”.
The Israeli military declined to comment.
Israel eliminated the three Hamas’ senior terrorists—Rafah Division commander Raed al-Attar, Southern Division commander Mohammed Abu Shmallah and Rafah Division senior commander Mohammed Barhoum—in an overnight strike on August, 2014.
The targeted elimination was a joint operation of the Shin Bet and IDF.
Over the years, Israel has established a network of contacts in the Palestinian Authority and Gaza, using a combination of pressure and sweeteners to entice Arabs to divulge intelligence.
Hamas has sentenced 109 people to death and executed at least 25 in Gaza since 2007. Human rights groups have repeatedly condemned such use of the death penalty, and urged Hamas and its Western-backed rival based in Judea and Samaria, the Palestinian Authority, to abolish it.
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