The IDF is targeting the top Hamas official Yahya Sinwar, who is hiding out in Gaza. Israel says he is "a dead man walking,"
Getty Images & Reuters
Israeli forces have Hamas' top leader surrounded in the ruins of Gaza City, Israel's defense minister said.
Yahya Sinwar, 61, is considered to be the mastermind behind the October 7 terrorist attacks on southern Israel that left 1,400 people dead and more than 240 hostages abducted to Gaza.
The Hamas government and its offices are based in Gaza City, which is currently under siege by Israeli forces.
Earlier this week, Yoav Gallant, Israel's defense minister, said in a TV press statement, per The Times. Sinwar was "hiding in his bunker without contact with his associates," Gallant said before vowing to eliminate him.
He said that Sinwar, the overall head of Hamas in the Gaza enclave, who has been described by Israeli officials as "a dead man walking," was surrounded, although he did not specify where.
On Friday, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) reported that its troops of the 7th Brigade had raided the office of Sinwar's brother, Muhammad, capturing military documents and killing 30 "terrorists."
Sinwar was freed in a prisoner swap after years in an Israeli prison in 2011. Back in Gaza, he worked closely with Mohammed Deif, the commander of the Iz Ad Din Al Qassam Brigades — Hamas's military wing and a "specially designated global terror group," according to US authorities.
Sinwar and Deif were central to the planning of the October 7 attacks, it is believed.
REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa AJ/JJ
Yahya Ibrahim Hassan Sinwar was born in a Palestinian refugee camp in Khan Younis, southern Gaza, in 1962, according to The Jewish Virtual Library. His parents fled the southern city of Ashkelon in Israel. He pursued Arabic studies at the Islamic University of Gaza.
In the 1980s, Sinwar's job was to kill Gazans who collaborated with Israel, per The Economist.
He spent 24 years in prison for crimes including the murder of two Israeli soldiers and four Palestinian men he had accused of collaborating.
Israeli doctors reportedly saved his life in 2006 after operating on a brain tumor during his incarceration.
He left prison fluent in Hebrew after his release in a prisoner swap for the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit, who was being held hostage in Gaza.
In 2015, the US Department of State designated Sinwar a terrorist.
"We will take down the border, and we will tear their hearts from their bodies," Sinwar reportedly said in 2018, as quoted by the IDF.
On October 7, under Sinwar's leadership, hundreds of Hamas fighters breached the fences surrounding Gaza, after drones knocked out hi-tech observation towers and a huge rocket barrage was unleashed on Israel. They poured into southern Israel's surrounding kibbutzes and towns, committing massacres in coordinated terrorist attacks.
Former Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid dubbed him the "new face of evil."
"That man is in our sights," said Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, a military spokesman, per The New York Times. "He's a dead man walking, and we will get to that man," he said.
He is considered to be a key figure connecting Hamas's politburo with the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas' armed wing, per The European Council on Foreign Relations.
Israel has arrested Sinwar multiple times, and he has spent 24 years in prison, per the European Council of Foreign Relations. He was released during a prisoner exchange with Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit in 2011.
A 2022 security analysis determined that the Palestinian Authority's weakness and Israel's inaction on undermining Hamas' control strengthened Sinwar and Hamas' leadership. Hamas was able to connect various fronts against Israel, per The Institute for National Security Studies of Tel-Aviv University
The analysis predicted that the temporary calm amid Sinwar and Hamas' increased power would exact a "heavy toll from Israel in longer, strategic terms."
The IDF said destroying Gaza's leadership was its ultimate goal as it prepares to launch a ground invasion of the besieged city, The New York Times reports. Thousands of Hamas militants are believed to have entrenched themselves in an elaborate network of underground tunnels in northern Gaza.
The invasion's goal will be "the rout of Hamas and the elimination of its leaders after the slaughter they perpetrated," said Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, the IDF's chief spokesman, per The Times.
