Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh speaks during a press conference in Tehran, Iran, March 26, 2024. Photo: Majid Asgaripour/WANA (West Asia News Agency) via REUTERS

Three sons of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh were killed in an Israeli airstrike in the Gaza Strip on Wednesday, the Palestinian terrorist group and Haniyeh’s family said.

The Israeli military confirmed carrying out the attack, describing the three sons as terrorist operatives in Hamas’ armed wing.

The three sons — Hazem, Amir, and Mohammad — were killed when the car they were driving was bombed in Gaza’s Al-Shati camp, Hamas said, adding that four of Haniyeh’s grandchildren, three girls and a boy, were also killed in the attack.

Asked about the four grandchildren killed in the airstrike, the Israeli military said there was “no information on that right now.”

Haniyeh — who reportedly has an estimated net worth of $4 billion and lives a life of luxury abroad in exile in Qatar — has been the tough-talking face of Hamas’ international diplomacy as war with Israel has raged on in Gaza, where his family home was destroyed in an Israeli airstrike back in November.

“The blood of my sons is not dearer than the blood of our people,” Haniyeh, 61, who has 13 sons and daughters according to Hamas sources, told pan-Arab Al Jazeera TV.

The three sons and four grandchildren were making family visits during the first day of the Muslim Eid al-Fitr holiday in Shati, their home refugee camp in Gaza City, according to relatives.

Haniyeh is the politburo chief of Hamas and one of the Palestinian terrorist group’s most visible leaders. He said at a conference of the International Union of Muslim Scholars (IUMS) in Doha, Qatar, in January that “we should hold on to the victory that took place on Oct. 7 and build upon it,” adding, “Time is on our side.” On Oct. 7, Hamas terrorists invaded southern Israel from Gaza, murdering 1,200 people and kidnapping 253 others as hostages. The onslaught, which launched the ongoing Israel-Hamas war in Gaza, was the largest single-day massacre of Jews since the Holocaust.

Hamas said on Tuesday it was studying an Israeli ceasefire proposal in the more than six-month-old Gaza war but that it was “intransigent” and met none of the Palestinian demands.

“Our demands are clear and specific and we will not make concessions on them. The enemy will be delusional if it thinks that targeting my sons, at the climax of the negotiations and before the movement sends its response, will push Hamas to change its position,” Haniyeh said.

Hamas has demanded that any truce must include a permanent ceasefire and full withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza.

Israel has said any truce must include the release of all remaining hostages and be temporary, warning that a long-term ceasefire would allow Hamas to regroup and strengthen its position to continue attacking the Jewish state. Hamas leaders have pledged to carry out massacres against Israel like the one on Oct. 7 “again and again.”

Haniyeh’s eldest son confirmed in a Facebook post that his three brothers were killed. “Thanks to God who honored us by the martyrdom of my brothers, Hazem, Amir, and Mohammad and their children,” wrote Abdel-Salam Haniyeh.

Appointed to the terrorist group’s top job in 2017, Haniyeh has moved between Turkey and Qatar’s capital Doha, avoiding Israeli-imposed travel restrictions in blockaded Gaza and enabling him to act as a negotiator in the latest ceasefire negotiations and communicate with Hamas’ main ally Iran.