Senior Hamas leader killed in West Bank

TUBAS, West Bank (CNN) -- The body of a regional leader of Hamas' military wing was found Wednesday under the rubble of a West Bank house that the Israeli army demolished, Palestinian sources said.

The Israel Defense Forces confirmed that Nasser Jarrar was killed in the northern West Bank town of Tubas. Jarrar was a senior activist in the Izzedine al Qassam Brigades around the West Bank town of Jenin.

Palestinian sources said Jarrar was hiding in the house when Israeli troops surrounded it Wednesday afternoon.

The sources said the Israelis planted explosive charges around the house and an Israeli helicopter ignited them. Two bulldozers then smashed the house, the sources said.

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An IDF spokesman said Jarrar was involved in plotting a series of suicide attacks in Israel, including a plan to bring down a high-rise building.

Jarrar was wounded during a May 2001 attempt to set off bombs in the West Bank, the IDF spokesman said. Despite losing a hand and his legs, the IDF said, Jarrar continued to plot attacks against Israelis.

The IDF said interrogations of some Jarrar recruits for planned suicide missions helped the Israeli army to close down two bomb-making factories in Jenin where explosives belts and parts of Qassam rockets were found.

The IDF said that by preventing Jarrar's actions it had harmed the Hamas infrastructure in the northern West Bank.

The U.S. State Department has designated Hamas, a Palestinian Islamic fundamentalist group, as a terrorist organization. Izzedine al Qassam, the group's military wing, has admitted responsibility for terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians and the Israeli military.