GAZA (PIC)– Said Seyam a prominent Hamas leader and Interior Minister of the elected government of Ismail Haneyya was martyred Thursday evening along with his son his brother and his brother’s wife in an Israeli airstrike at a house in the Yarmouk neighbourhood at the centre of Gaza city.
Hamas sources said that Seyam was martyred when Israeli occupation airforce bombed the house of Sheikh Eyad Seyam the brother of Said Seyam during a visit by the latter to his brother’s house.
The bodyguard of Said Seyam was also martyred in the attack along with his brother and his brother’s wife.
Four other citizens from a neighbouring house were killed in the airstrike three of them children.
Eyewitnesses said that Israeli occupation airplanes fired two rockets at the house of Said Seyams brother.
Hamas mourned Said Seyam saying that leaders of the movement were always at the forefront and that Seyam has joined previous martyrs of the movement such as Sheikh Ahmad Yassin Dr. Abdel-Aziz al-Rantisi Ibrahim al-Maqdmah Ismail Abu Shanab Jamal Mansour Jamal Salim Salah Shehadeh and Dr. Nizar al-Rayyan.
Said Seyam was born on 22 July 1959 at the Shati’ Rafugee camp to the west of Gaza City as his family was uprooted in 1948 from the village of Jura near the city of Askalan.
He graduated at the Teachers College in Ramallah in 1980 with a Diploma in teaching sience and maths. He earned a degree in Islamic Studies from the Jerusalem Open University in 2000.
He taught at UNRWA schools in Gaza from 1980 till 2003 when he resigned as a result of harassment of the employer because of his political affiliation.
He worked as a voluntary Imam of the Yarmouk Mosque in Gaza city as well as other mosques in the Gaza Strip.
He participated in the reconciliation committees formed by late Shiekh Ahmad Yassin during the first intifada.
He was a trustee of the Islamic university a founder member of the Future Research Centre head of external relations department and a member of the political leadership of the Hamas movement.
He was elected to the Palestinian Legislative Council in 2006 and was appointed Interior Minister in the tenth PA government.
He was married and a father of six children.
