An Israeli airstrike on a car deep inside Lebanon has killed a senior Hamas figure, a source from the Palestinian group and two other security sources have told Reuters.

The strike, on the southern edges of the Lebanese port city of Sidon some 60 kilometres from the frontier, killed Samer al-Hajj, a Hamas security official who works in the nearby refugee camp for Palestinians, Ain al-Hilweh. His bodyguard was critically wounded, the three sources said.