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The long-sought mastermind of Hamas October 7, 2023, terrorist attacks was killed during an Israeli military operation in the Gaza Strip, Israel said Thursday.
“I stand before you today to inform you that Yahya Sinwar has been eliminated,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a televised statement.
The Israeli army said Sinwar was killed by soldiers in southern Gaza on Wednesday. Hamas has not yet confirmed his death.
Yahya Sinwar was declared The new political head of Hamas in August, after the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh. Sinwar’s death will be a major blow to the militant group and its supporters – and a major coup for Israel and its supporters. war in the Gaza Strip.
Before Sinwar’s death was announced, a senior Israeli official told NBC News that troops had identified him as one of three militants killed during a “heavy firefight” in Gaza. But, they said, the operation was not specifically aimed at killing Sinwar.
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The IDF and the Shin Bet had noted in a joint statement earlier Thursday that there were “no signs of the presence of hostages in the area” of the building where Sinwar and two other militants were killed.
The IDF had promised to capture Sinwar “dead or alive” after the October 7, 2023, attacks that killed about 1,200 people and took about 250 hostage.
Sinwar was in charge of Gaza’s executive committee before October 7 and was named Hamas’s new political leader after Haniyeh was killed in an airstrike on his hometown in Tehran in July.
Haniyeh attended the Iranian president’s inauguration ceremony Masoud Pezeshkian. Israel, which is usually silent about targeted killingsis believed to have carried out the attack.
Sinwar, who was born in a Gaza refugee camp in the early 1960s, joined Hamas after its founding in 1987 and helped establish its Internal Security Force a year later, according to a profile of him by the European Council on Foreign Relations think tank.
He was sentenced to life in prison in 1988 for plotting the murder of two Israeli soldiers, as well as the murder of four Palestinians he suspected of collaborating with Israel. He was released years later, in 2011, as one of more than a thousand Palestinian prisoners released in exchange for Gilad Shalitan Israeli soldier held by Hamas for more than five years.
Sinwar quickly rose through the ranks of the militant group and was elevated to the helm in 2017 by secret ballot.
The already elusive Hamas leader went into hiding after the October 7 attacks and is believed to be hidden in the extensive tunnel system used by Hamas militants in Gaza, according to Israeli officials.
In a statement, the headquarters of the Hostages and Missing Families Forum, which represents the families of hostages held by Hamas, said it welcomed the possibility of Sinwar’s killing and urged using “this great achievement to facilitate the return of the hostages.”
Of the approximately 250 people taken hostage in Gaza during the October 7 attacks, 154 have been released. According to Israeli officials, 101 hostages are still being held in Gaza, including 33 believed dead.
“I am hopeful that his personal reign of terror has ended,” said Thomas Hand, his father Emily Handwho was released by Hamas in November as part of a temporary ceasefire, NBC News told reporters ahead of Israel’s announcement confirming Sinwar’s death.
“I hope this major blow to their chain of command will help put an end to this terrible war,” he said. “Maybe they will feel weak enough to come to the table and finally make a serious deal to end the war and give us back our poor hostages after more than a YEAR in brutal captivity.”
Foreign Minister Israel Katz said Sinwar’s death “would create an opportunity for the immediate release of the hostages and a potential change that could lead to a new reality in Gaza – without Hamas and without Iranian control.”
“For example, this is important for the Israeli government, at least in terms of a political victory, as the anniversary of the October 7 attack has only just passed,” said Mahdi Ghuloom, a regional security analyst at Le Beck International. , told NBC News.
While Israelis would welcome the news of Sinwar’s death, it did not fundamentally change the situation of the hostages held in Gaza, said Ronni Shaked, a researcher at the Harry S. Truman Institute of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
“It is a very happy moment for every Israeli. But I don’t think this will change the situation for the Israelis who have been kidnapped,” he said. “Israel will not find a new way to bring them back now because it is not only in Sinwar’s hands.”
Rashid Khalidi, professor emeritus of modern Arab studies at Columbia University and author of “The Hundred Years’ War on Palestine,” agreed, saying Sinwar’s killing represented a “Pyrrhic victory.”
“Sinwar’s killing, if confirmed, will not minimize resistance to Israeli occupations,” he said before the news was announced.
More than 42,400 people have been killed in Gaza, health officials there say, in the year since Israel launched its offensive after the attacks.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
