Two senior Hamas leaders linked to the notorious 2006 abduction of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit have been killed in separate airstrikes on Gaza just hours apart, according to the Israeli military.

A strike targeting the Bureij refugee camp in central Gaza Tuesday claimed the life of Ayman Nofal, a top commander in Hamas’ military wing known as the Al-Qassam Brigades — the most high-profile militant known to have been killed so far in the war with Israel.

Hamas confirmed Nofal’s death in a Telegram post Tuesday, hailing him as a “martyr” who was killed “as a result of a barbaric Zionist bombing.”

Nofal was in charge of Hamas militant activities in the central Gaza Strip and was associated with the creation of the group’s “joint operations” room that coordinated between Hamas, the Palestinian Islamic Jihad and other terrorist groups in the area.

“Nofal directed many attacks against Israeli civilians and besides being one of the most dominant figures in the terrorist organization, he was involved in the planning of the abduction of Gilad Shalit,” the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said in a statement on X, formerly Twitter.

Shalit, a former IDF soldier, was captured by Palestinian militants in June 2006 and was held captive by Hamas in Gaza for more than 5 years until his release in 2011 as part of a controversial prisoner swap that saw 1,027 Palestinian inmates released, among them convicted murderers and terrorists.

IDF also shared aerial footage showing the airstrike it said killed Nofal.

“We won’t stop until we eliminate Hamas,” the Israeli military wrote.

It comes after the Israeli Air Force announced Monday that it killed Osama Mazini, the head of Hamas’ Shura Council and the group’s chief hostage negotiator who was tasked with handling Shalit’s case during his captivity.

Mazini “directed terrorist activities against Israel,” the air force wrote in a post on X accompanying footage of the bombing that reportedly took out the leader.

Earlier Monday, the IDF shared video of another airstrike targeting the city of Khan Yunis in the Gaza Strip that it said eliminated the chief of Hamas general intelligence service.