A Palestinian militant was killed in an Israeli air strike on a car in the southern Gaza Strip on Saturday, Palestinian security sources and witnesses said.
Khaled Abu Sitta, 25, a senior leader from the Abu el-Reesh Brigades, was killed when an Israeli missile hit the car that he was driving near the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, they said.
The missile tore through the vehicle, turning it into a pile of scorched and twisted metal. Angry crowds pulled Sitta's body out of the rubble and took him to a local morgue where he was identified.
The Abu el-Reesh Brigades, an armed group in the main Fatah faction, has been involved in firing rockets into Israel. Israel has vowed to track down and kill militants behind such attacks.
On Wednesday, it killed four militants in the Gaza Strip in a strike on their car. Earlier on Saturday, militants fired a rocket at an Israeli farming community near Gaza and the army responded by firing artillery shells towards open fields in northern Gaza.
Nobody was hurt in either incident. Israel withdrew from the Gaza Strip in September after a 38 year occupation.