Israeli forces have announced the death of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, who was a key figure behind the attack on October 7, 2023, which ignited the Gaza war.
According to Israel’s Army Radio, the incident occurred during a ground operation in Rafah, a city in southern Gaza, where Israeli troops also neutralized three militants.
Mr. Sinwar, 62, was regarded as the mastermind of the Hamas cross-border assaults from October 7 of the previous year, which marked the deadliest day in Israel’s history. He had been a wanted individual by Israel since the conflict began.
Since the 2023 attack, Mr. Sinwar had not made any public appearances, but sources close to him reported that he remained unrepentant despite the severe Israeli invasion that has resulted in tens of thousands of Palestinian casualties, devastated his home in Gaza, and brought havoc to ally Hezbollah.
Ideology shaped by a childhood in Gaza’s refugee camps
Mr. Sinwar’s determination was believed to be influenced by his difficult upbringing in Gaza’s refugee camps, alongside a harsh 22-year imprisonment by Israel—part of which was spent in Ashkelon, the town his parents fled after the 1948 Arab-Israeli war.
Before the onset of the current conflict, Mr. Sinwar often recounted his early life in Gaza during the long years of Israeli occupation, sharing how his mother crafted clothing from empty UN food-aid sacks, as told by Gaza resident Wissam Ibrahim, who had met him.
He joined Hamas shortly after its establishment in the 1980s, embracing the group’s radical Islamic ideology aimed at creating an Islamic state in historic Palestine and opposing the existence of Israel.
Within this framework, the adversities and struggles he faced were frequently viewed by him and his followers as part of a broader Islamic narrative of sacrifice, according to experts on Islamic movements.
“What fuels his determination is a steadfast ideology and unwavering objectives. He lives simply and is content with little,” stated a senior Hamas official who chose to remain anonymous.
Yahya Sinwar became a member of Hamas soon after it was founded in the 1980s
Over 20 years in Israeli custody
Mr. Sinwar was arrested in 1988 and sentenced to four life sentences for his role in the kidnapping and murder of two Israeli soldiers and four suspected Palestinian informants.
Nabih Awadah, a former Lebanese Communist militant who shared a prison with Mr. Sinwar, claimed the Hamas leader considered the 1993 Oslo peace accords between Israel and the Palestinian Authority to be “disastrous.”
Describing him as “willful and dogmatic,” Mr. Awadah noted that Mr. Sinwar would light up with delight upon learning of attacks on Israelis by either Hamas or Lebanon’s Hezbollah.
He maintained that military confrontation was the only avenue toward “liberating Palestine” from Israeli control.
According to Mr. Awadah, Mr. Sinwar served as a significant influence among all prisoners, not just those who identified as Islamists or religious.
Michael Koubi, a former official with Israel’s Shin Bet security agency who interrogated Mr. Sinwar for 180 hours while he was incarcerated, stated that Mr. Sinwar was notable for his capacity to intimidate and lead.
During one interrogation, Mr. Koubi inquired why Mr. Sinwar, then around 28 or 29, was not married. “He replied, ‘Hamas is my wife, Hamas is my child. Hamas is everything to me.’
Mr. Sinwar married following his release from prison in 2011 and is a father of three.
In prison, he played a crucial leadership role during a hunger strike in 1992, leading over 1,000 inmates who survived solely on water and salt.
He negotiated with prison officials and refused to accept only partial concessions. During his incarceration, he also learned to speak Hebrew fluently.
As a ruthless enforcer, he gained notoriety for punishing Palestinians suspected of collaborating with Israel, establishing himself as a prison leader and emerging from incarceration as a street figure.
Yahya Sinwar was arrested in 1988, accused of orchestrating the abduction and murder of two Israeli soldiers and four suspected Palestinian informants
A new war-hungry leader for Hamas
Mr. Sinwar’s leadership over Hamas remained strong, despite some indications of dissent among the people of Gaza.
His grasp of the daily hardships and harsh realities faced by Gazans earned their acceptance, according to officials, despite his fearsome reputation and volatile temper.
He was appointed the overall leader of the Islamist movement following the death of his predecessor Ismail Haniyeh, who was reportedly killed in July by an Israeli strike during a visit to Tehran.
Operating covertly from a network of complex tunnels beneath Gaza, two Israeli sources indicated that Mr. Sinwar and his brother, also a high-ranking commander, appeared to have survived recent Israeli airstrikes, which allegedly resulted in the deaths of his deputy Mohammed Deif and other senior leaders.
Labeling him ‘The Face of Evil,’ Israel noted that Sinwar operated in secrecy, frequently moving and communicating through trusted messengers to avoid digital communication, as per Hamas officials.
Sources revealed that Mr. Sinwar was the sole decision-maker throughout the protracted ceasefire negotiations led by Qatar and Egypt, which concentrated on exchanging prisoners for hostages.
Negotiators often waited several days for replies filtered through a clandestine network of messengers.
Before executing the raids on October 7, Mr. Sinwar had openly expressed his intent to strike his adversaries hard.
In a speech the previous year, he promised to send fighters and rockets into Israel, suggesting a war that could either unify global support for a Palestinian state or isolate the Jewish nation internationally.
By the time of the speech, Mr. Sinwar and Deif had already formulated clandestine plans for the assault and were conducting public training drills simulating such an operation.
A billboard showing Yahya Sinwar overlooks streets in Tel Aviv, Israel
October attacks and the beginning of war
The attacks on October 7 resulted in the deaths of 1,200 individuals, primarily civilians, and the capture of 250 hostages, based on Israeli figures, marking the deadliest day for Jews since the Holocaust.
In response, Israel launched a large-scale military operation, which killed approximately 42,400 people and displaced 1.9 million individuals, according to local health authorities and United Nations statistics.
The conflict has now extended to Lebanon, where Israel has severely weakened the Iranian-backed militant group Hezbollah, including the elimination of most of its leadership. Iran, a patron of Hamas, is at risk of entering an open conflict with Israel.
Mr. Sinwar has drawn Iran and its entire “Axis of Resistance”—including Hezbollah, Yemen’s Houthis, and Iraqi militias—into confrontation with Israel, asserted author and researcher Hassan Hassan.
He stated, “We are presently witnessing the ripple effects of October 7. Sinwar’s gamble did not pay off.”
“What Israel accomplished against Hezbollah in two weeks is nearly equivalent to an entire year of degrading Hamas in Gaza. With Hezbollah, three levels of leadership have been eradicated; its military command has been devastated, and its significant leader Hassan Nasrallah has been killed.”
