GAZA CITY: An Israeli airstrike killed a senior commander in the Palestinian militant group Islamic Jihad, authorities said Sunday, its second leader to be slain amid an escalating cross-border conflict.

The killing late Saturday of Khaled Mansour, who led the Iran-backed Islamic Jihad's operations in the southern Gaza Strip, came a day after another Israeli strike killed the militant's commander in the north. Already, the fighting has killed at least 29 Palestinians and seen hundreds of rockets fired toward Israel in the worst violence between Israel and Palestinian militants since the end of an 11-day war in 2021.