Israeli forces claim to have killed Yahya Sinwar, the Hamas leader known as Bin Laden in Gaza. Yahya Sinwar is said to be the person who planned the attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. More than 1,200 Israelis were killed in the attack.
Sinwar’s death is a huge blow to Hamas. After the killing of Ismail Haniyeh, Yahya Sinwar became the leader of Hamas. Israel’s aim is to destroy Hamas’s leadership in Gaza, and Sinwar is its main target. Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said that Yahya Sinwar, who was responsible for the massacre and atrocities on October 7, had been killed by the Israel Defense Forces.
Who will lead Hamas now?
At the same time, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu said that we have settled the score on October 7, but the war will continue. Sinwar has avoided Israel for months. It is unclear who will lead Hamas. Key Hamas leaders who have survived Israeli attacks and may take over the organization in the future are as follows:
Khalid Mashaal: Khaled Mashal was born on May 28, 1956, near Ramallah, West Bank. At 15, he joined the Muslim Brotherhood, a Sunni Islamic organization based in Egypt. Hamas was founded in 1987 with the help of the Muslim Brotherhood. Time magazine has dubbed Khaled Mashaal “the man who haunts Israel.”
Khalid Mashal, 68, has been working since his exile. From 2004 to 2012, he ran the organization in the Syrian capital Damascus. He now lives in Qatar and the Egyptian capitals Doha and Cairo. Meshal first visited the Hamas-controlled Gaza Strip in 2012 and spoke at a rally marking Hamas’ 25th anniversary.
Bana Meshaal, the leader of the Hamas political office, was injected with a slow-acting poison by Israeli agents in Jordan, causing him to fall into a coma and was later somehow rescued. Meshaal’s career has taken him from one Arab country to another, including Kuwait, Jordan, Qatar and Syria. He succeeded Haniyeh in 2017 after he resigned as head of Hamas’s political office. Meshaal is still considered one of Hamas’ top leaders.
Deputy Leader Khalil Haya: Khalil al-Hayya, who currently lives in exile in Qatar, has been Hamas’s top leader for decades and was the deputy who killed Sinwar. Survived an Israeli assassination attempt in 2007. Israel subsequently carried out air strikes on his house in Gaza, killing his family.
Moussa Abu MarzoukAbu Marzouk, a member of the Hamas Supreme Politburo and one of the founders of Hamas, began his political career in the United Arab Emirates, where he helped found a branch of the Palestinian Muslim Brotherhood. He later moved to the United States, where he helped establish Islamic organizations, including those focused on the Palestinian cause.
In 1996, when he took office as head of the Hamas Political Bureau, he was accused by Israel of financing and organizing terrorist attacks. After spending 22 months in a Manhattan jail on suspicion of terrorism, he agreed to give up his status as a permanent resident of the United States. He later said he would not fight the terrorism charges that led to his detention. The United States subsequently deported him to Jordan.
Hamas army commander Mohammed Deif: Mohammed Daf, also said to be the mastermind of the October 7 attack, joined Hamas as a young man. In 2002, he became leader of the Qassam Brigades, the military wing of Hamas, replacing its founder who was killed in an Israeli attack. Since then, deaf people have planned several attacks against Israel, including a series of suicide bombings in 1996.
In July, Israeli forces violently bombarded Gaza’s densely populated coastal areas in an attempt to kill Deif. Many people in Gaza were killed in the attacks. The Israeli military later said Deif was killed in the attack. Hamas neither confirmed nor denied his death.
He has been at the top of Israel’s most wanted terrorist list for decades, according to Israeli intelligence agencies. Prior to this, there had been eight fatal attacks against him. In 2014, one of his wives and young son were killed in an Israeli airstrike.
