The Israeli government also defended the decision to order the strike — which the officials said used at least five U.S.-made precision-guided bombs — in an area Israel itself has designated a humanitarian zone for Palestinians driven from their homes by the war between Israel and Hamas.
The strike was authorized after prolonged observation of the villa, one of Mr. Salameh’s secret command posts, according to the three senior Israeli officials.
The villa is in an area known as Al-Mawasi, west of Khan Younis near the Mediterranean Sea. It belonged to Mr. Salameh’s family, two of the officials said, and Mr. Salameh began spending more time there in recent months after Israeli forces overran many of his other strongholds in Khan Younis, both above and below ground, according to two of the officials. All the officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly about details of the operation.
Mr. Salameh still spent much of his time in Hamas’s underground tunnel network, but he also stayed regularly at the villa, along with his family and other militants, to escape the stifling conditions in the tunnels, the officials said.
Officers from an Israeli unit that oversees the identification of high-value targets, staffed by operatives from military intelligence and the Shin Bet, detected Mr. Salameh’s presence several weeks ago, the officials said. But, they added, Israeli leaders decided to delay any attempts to kill him to see if he would be joined at some point by Mr. Deif.
