Nizar Rayyan, a considered successor of Hammas founder Ahmed Yassin [wiki], has been killed January 1, 2009 after an Israeli airstrike targeted his house at the Jabalya Palestinian refugee camp in the northern Gaza. Together with him were several of his family members according to Xinhua. Nizar Rayyan (pictured above), Hamas's political-military liaison, is the most senior Hamas leader to be killed since the death of Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi [wiki] in April 2004, BBC noted.