Yahya Sinwar

Thursday

Charles Lipson

What follows Sinwar’s death in Israel’s war in Gaza and beyond 

Yahya Sinwar, the Hamas leader and strategist responsible for the largest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust, is dead, killed by the Israeli Defense Forces in a tunnel beneath his hometown of Rafah in Gaza.   Although the Biden administration (rightfully) congratulated Israel, both President Biden and Vice President Harris had previously demanded Israel not stage a major military operation in Rafah, where Sinwar and other Hamas leaders were killed. That advice matched the administration’s strategic wisdom throughout the conflict.   With Sinwar gone, the key questions now are: what is the endgame in Gaza? And how does Israel’s success in Gaza affect the current battle against Hezbollah in Lebanon and the future battle against the Islamic Republic of Iran?

yahya sinwar
sinwar netanyahu
Daniel DePetris

How will Yahya Sinwar’s death change Netanyahu’s calculations?

It was a short, stern, matter-of-fact message from the Israeli Defense Forces — "Eliminated: Yahya Sinwar." The man the Israeli military establishment was searching for throughout Gaza's alleyways, underground tunnels and blasted-out buildings for more than a year, responsible for the worst terrorist attack on Israel since the founding of the state, is now dead and gone. Sinwar becomes the latest in a long line of Hamas leaders and commanders — Ahmed Yassin, Abdel Aziz Rantisi, Mohammed Deif and Ismail Haniyeh, to name a few — who have eventually met their fate at Israel’s hand.  Sinwar, however, often made the others look like conciliatory men. The sixty-something-year-old Palestinian, born in a Gaza refugee camp, lived and breathed Hamas for his entire adult life.