Warning: This article contains graphic images.
Israel announced Thursday that the man long sought as the mastermind of the October 7, 2023 Hamas terrorist attack was killed in an Israeli military operation in the Gaza Strip.
“I stand before you today to tell you that Yahya Sinwar has been removed,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a televised statement.
The Israel Defense Forces said Mr. Shinwar was killed by soldiers in southern Gaza on Wednesday. Hamas has not yet confirmed his death.
Yahya Sinwar was declared Hamas’ new political leader in August after the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh. Mr. Shinwar’s death would be a significant blow to the extremist group and its supporters, and a major coup d’état for Israel and the war in the Gaza Strip.
Before Shinwar’s death was announced, a senior Israeli official told NBC News that the military had identified him as one of three militants killed in an “intense gunfight” in Gaza. But they said the operation was not specifically aimed at killing Sinwar.
Follow us to watch live coverage
The IDF and Shin Bet said in a joint statement earlier Thursday that there was “no indication that there were any hostages in the area” of the building where Shinwar and two other militants were killed.
The Israel Defense Forces had vowed to capture Sinwar “dead or alive” following the October 7, 2023 attack that killed around 1,200 people and took around 250 hostages.
Mr. Sinwar was in charge of Gaza’s day-to-day governance before October 7, and was named Hamas’ new political leader after Mr. Haniya was killed in an airstrike on his Tehran mansion in July.
Haniya was attending the inauguration of Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian. Israel, which typically remains silent about targeted assassinations, is believed to have carried out the latest attack.
Sinwar was born in a Gaza refugee camp in the early 1960s, joined Hamas after it was founded in 1987, and helped establish its internal security force a year later, according to a profile of him compiled by the European Council on Foreign Relations think tank. did.
He was sentenced to life in prison in 1988 for planning the murder of two Israeli soldiers and killing four Palestinians suspected of collaborating with Israel. He was released several years later, in 2011, as one of more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners of war freed in exchange for Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who had been held by Hamas for more than five years.
Sinwar rose rapidly within the armed group and was elevated to real power in a secret ballot in 2017.
The long-disappeared Hamas leader went into hiding after the October 7 attack and is believed to be hiding in an elaborate tunnel system used by Hamas militants in the Gaza Strip, Israeli officials said. That’s what it means.
The headquarters of the Hostage and Missing Families Forum, which represents families of hostages held by Hamas, said in a statement Thursday that it welcomed the possible killing of Sinwar and said it would use “this major achievement to secure the return of hostages.” He said he asked for it.
Of the approximately 250 people taken hostage in Gaza in the October 7 attack, 154 have been released and 101 hostages are still being held in Gaza, of whom 33 have died, Israeli officials said. It is thought that.
Thomas Hand, the father of Emily Hand, who was released by Hamas in November as part of a temporary cease-fire agreement, said ahead of Israel’s announcement of Sinwar’s death that his “personal reign of terror is over.” I hope so,” he told NBC News. .
“We hope this major blow to their chain of command will help end this terrible war,” he said. “Perhaps they felt weak enough after more than a year of brutal captivity to come to the negotiating table and finally make serious efforts to end the war and return us our poor hostages.” We will make a deal.”
Foreign Minister Israel Katz said Shinwar’s death would create “an opportunity for the immediate release of the hostages and changes that could lead to a new reality for Gaza without Hamas and without Iranian control.”
Mahdi Groom, a regional security analyst at Le Bec International, said: “For example, the commemoration of the October 7 attack has just passed, and this is an important thing for the Israeli government, at least in terms of a political victory.” ” he said. he told NBC News.
Roni Sheked, a researcher at the Harry S. Truman Institute at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, said that while Israelis would welcome the news of Sinwar’s death, the situation with the hostages in Gaza is fundamentally He says it hasn’t changed.
“This is a very happy moment for all Israelis. But I don’t think the situation will change for the kidnapped Israelis,” he said, adding, “Israel now intends to find new ways to bring them back.” No, because it is not in Shinwar’s hands alone.”
Rashid Khalidi, professor emeritus of modern Arab studies at Columbia University and author of “The Hundred Years’ War against Palestine,” agreed, saying that Sinwar’s killing represented a “Pyrrhic victory.”
“Even if Mr. Shinwar’s killing is confirmed, it will not minimize resistance to the Israeli occupation,” he said before the news was released.
More than 42,400 people have been killed in the Gaza Strip in the year since Israel launched its offensive following the attacks, according to health officials.
