Israel says Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, architect of October 7, killed in Gaza – National
Israeli forces in Gaza have killed top Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, the mastermind of last year’s attacks on Israel that sparked the ongoing conflict, the military said on Thursday. Soldiers are seen running through him in battle, but later discover that the body in the rubble is the man Israel has been hunting for over a year.
Sinwar has been at the top of Israel’s most wanted list since the current conflict with Hamas began over a year ago, and his killing has come as a shock to the militant group. There was no immediate confirmation from Hamas of his death.
The army confirmed Sinwar’s death after conducting DNA and other tests on the body, which it said was among three soldiers killed on Wednesday during an operation in Gaza. Foreign Minister Israel Katz called Sinwar’s killing “a military and moral success for the Israeli army,” and said it would “create an opportunity to quickly release the hostages.”
Sinwar was one of the main architects of the Hamas attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, and Israel has vowed to kill him since the beginning of their revenge campaign in Gaza. He has been the top leader of Hamas inside the Gaza Strip for years, closely linked to its military wing while building its power dramatically.
An Israeli security official said it appeared that the man, identified as Sinwar, had been killed in combat, not in a targeted attack.
Pictures circulating online showed the body of a man who looked like Sinwar with an open head wound, wearing a military vest, partially buried in the rubble of a demolished building. A security official confirmed that the photos were taken by Israeli security officials at the scene. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because of the ongoing investigation.
Israel’s N12 news site said Sinwar appeared to have been accidentally killed in Wednesday’s battle. It is said that the soldiers followed a group of soldiers into the building, then attacked the soldiers by setting fire to the tank, causing the building to collapse. As the soldiers exhumed the dead soldiers, they noticed that one looked like Sinwar.
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Sinwar was imprisoned by Israel from the late 1980s until 2011, and during that time he was being treated for brain cancer – leaving the Israeli authorities with many medical records.
President Joe Biden has been briefed on Israel’s investigation into whether Sinwar was killed, and US officials were in contact with Israeli officials Thursday morning, according to a senior administration official.
Sinwar was appointed as Hamas’ top leader in July after his predecessor, Ismail Haniyeh, was killed in an Israeli strike in the Iranian capital, Tehran. Israel also claimed to have killed the head of the Hamas military wing, Mohammed Deif, in an airstrike, but the group said he survived.
The news of his death came as Israeli forces continued more than a week of air and ground attacks on the Jabaliya refugee camp in northern Gaza. On Thursday, an Israeli airstrike hit a school sheltering displaced Palestinians, killing at least 28 people, according to the Hamas-run Gaza Health Ministry.
Fares Abu Hamza, head of the Gaza Health Ministry’s emergency department in the north, said the dead included a woman and four children, correcting an earlier report of five children. He said a lot of people were injured.
The Israeli military said it targeted a command center run by Hamas and Islamic Jihad inside the school. It provided a list of names of about a dozen people it identified as soldiers who were present when the strike was called.
Israel has repeatedly attacked tents and schools sheltering displaced people in Gaza. The Israeli military says it carries out direct strikes against terrorists and tries to avoid harming civilians, but its strikes often kill women and children.
Israel launched its operation in Gaza to eliminate Hamas after the militants stormed southern Israel on October 7, 2023, killing about 1,200 people, most of them civilians, and kidnapping about 250 people. About 100 hostages are still inside Gaza, about a third of whom are believed to be dead.
Israel’s offensive has killed more than 42,000 Palestinians, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. It does not distinguish between civilians and combatants but says women and children make up slightly more than half of the dead.
Northern Gaza was the first target of Israel’s attacks in the world almost a year ago and has been devastated by the current war, as all neighborhoods in Gaza City and other cities have been reduced to rubble. Most people fled after Israel issued evacuation orders in the early days of its military campaign, but around 400,000 are believed to have remained in dire conditions.
Earlier this month, Israel again ordered the evacuation of many people in the north, and did not allow food aid to enter the area for nearly two weeks. That has led many Palestinians to fear that they have adopted the surrender or starvation strategy advocated by former Israeli generals.
Israel allowed two aid shipments into the north earlier this week after the United States warned it could cut its military aid if its ally does not do more to address the humanitarian crisis.
Since the start of the conflict, Israeli forces have repeatedly launched operations in Jabaliya, a refugee camp with a large urban population dating back to the 1948 war surrounding Israel’s creation. The military says the militants have regrouped several times there after major campaigns.
Magdy reported from Cairo, Jeffery from Jerusalem. Associated Press writer Kareem Chehayeb in Beirut contributed.
