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Hamas said on Tuesday it had named its Gaza leader, Yahya Sinwar, as successor to former political leader Ismail Haniyeh, who was assassinated in Tehran last week, in a move that reinforces the radical line Hamas has taken since the October 7 attack on Israel.
Sinwar, the mastermind of the deadliest attack on Israel in decades, has been hiding in Gaza since the start of the war and Israel has tried in vain to kill him.
“The Islamic Resistance Hamas announced the election of Commander Yahya Sinwar as Chairman of the Political Bureau of the movement, replacing the martyred Commander Ismail Haniyeh, may Allah have mercy on him,” the Islamic Resistance Hamas said in a brief statement.
News of the appointment comes as Israel prepares to fend off a possible Iranian attack following Haniyeh’s killing in Tehran, and as militants in the Gaza Strip continue to battle and fire multiple rockets at Israeli forces.
“The appointment means Israel needs to negotiate with Sinwar on a solution to the Gaza war,” said a regional diplomat familiar with the Egyptian-Qatari-brokered talks aimed at halting fighting in Gaza and returning the 115 Israeli and foreign hostages still held in the Strip.
“It’s a tough message and it’s uncompromising.”
Sinwar, who has spent half his adult life in Israeli prisons, was the most powerful Hamas leader still alive after Haniyeh’s assassination. Iran has vowed severe retaliation, plunging the region into a wider conflict.
Israel has not claimed responsibility for the assassination but has claimed to have killed other senior leaders, including Hamas deputy leader Saleh al-Arouri and the movement’s military commander Mohammed Dafe, who were killed in Beirut.
Sinwar, 61, was born in a refugee camp in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis and was elected as Hamas’ leader in Gaza in 2017 after earning a reputation among Palestinians as a ruthless enforcer and irreconcilable enemy of Israel.
Israel’s chief military spokesman, Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, blamed Sinwar for the Oct. 7 attack and said Israel would continue to hunt him.
“There is only one place for Yahya Sinwar, and that is with Mohammed Deif and the other October 7 terrorists. This is the only place we have prepared and planned for him,” he told Al-Arabiya TV, according to a statement released by the military.
Ceasefire negotiations
In a sign that the movement has united in its choice of Sinwar, a senior source in the movement said that former leader Khaled Mashaal, who was seen as a potential successor to Haniyeh, supported Sinwar “out of loyalty to Gaza and its people who are waging the war of the Al-Aqsa flood”.
For Israel, the appointment confirms Hamas as an enemy committed to its destruction and is likely to reinforce Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s insistence that Israel must fight the Gaza campaign to the end.
The White House declined to comment on Sinwar’s appointment, but a person familiar with Washington’s thinking said the appointment was a sign that Hamas could take a hard line in ceasefire talks, making it more difficult to reach a deal.
They added, however, that Israel had been aware, even before his formal appointment, that he would have the final say on any truce agreement and that the statement simply confirmed that.
The war has changed the face of the Middle East and threatens to turn into a wider regional conflict since thousands of Hamas fighters descended on Israeli communities around the Gaza Strip in the early hours of October 7.
About 1,200 Israelis and foreigners were killed and more than 250 were taken hostage to Gaza. In response, Israel launched a brutal campaign that has so far killed nearly 40,000 Palestinians and reduced the densely populated region to ruins.
Efforts to reach a ceasefire that would have given a weary population a respite and allowed hostages still being held to return home have failed amid mutual accusations between Hamas and Israel.
Hamas official Osama Hamdan told Al Jazeera that Hamas remains committed to reaching a deal and that the negotiating team under Haniyeh will continue under the leadership of Sinwar, who he said was closely following the progress of the talks.
But Hani Masri, a Ramallah-based political analyst, said the appointment of Sinwar as Hamas leader was a direct challenge to Israel and sent a message that Hamas was sticking to its “extremist and resistance approach.”
“Sinwar controls the negotiations, and he controls the movement,” he said.
Read more by Euractiv
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