On Tuesday, Hamas named Yahya Sinwar, the group’s leader in Gaza, to head the political bureau after the Israeli killing of Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran.
Before he was killed last week, Haniyeh served as the highest-level Hamas official outside of Gaza and was the public face of the group as it was engaged in hostage deal negotiations with Israel, although Hamas officials said Sinwar was ultimately in charge of the talks.
Sinwar has been Hamas’s leader in Gaza since 2017, and Israel attempted to assassinate him when he was re-elected in 2021. Sinwar is believed to be hiding deep inside the expansive tunnel system under the Gaza Strip since he is the top target for the Israeli military.
Sinwar and the head of Hamas’s military wing, Mohammed Deif, are said to be the masterminds behind the October 7 attack on southern Israel. Israel claims it killed Deif in a recent airstrike on a tent camp in Gaza, which killed at least 90 Palestinians, but his death hasn’t been confirmed by Hamas.
Hamas officials said the decision to appoint Sinwar as the head of the political bureau was made unanimously. “The Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas announces the selection of Commander Yahya Sinwar as the head of the political bureau of the movement, succeeding the martyr Commander Ismail Haniyeh, may Allah have mercy on him,” Hamas said in a statement.
The Israeli killing of Haniyeh suspended the indirect negotiations between Israel and Hamas. In the weeks leading up to the assassination, it was widely acknowledged by Israeli officials that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was doing everything he could to sabotage the chances of a hostage and ceasefire deal.
Both Yahya Sinwar and Ismail Haniyeh were born in 1962 in refugee camps in Gaza. That means for over 60 years they have known nothing else but life under a brutal Israeli military occupation. Shame on the world for allowing this travesty to go on for so long without demanding some semblance of justice for the dispossessed Palestinian people.
Yikes that appointment is going to pissoff a lot of Zionists in Israel.
Not really. Sinwar is trapped in Gaza with 2 million other Palestinians. For Israel it's just a matter of bombing fish in a barrel until the problem goes away.
Pat, this is exactly what the crimeminister wants. He doesn’t want a negotiator who is receptive to conditions toward peace, because he doesn’t want peace. He wants genocide and a wider war.
“Let there be peace on Earth and let it begin with me!with every step I take, a peace for eternity!”…..
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Hey, it's a positive development! This new guy's NAME even tells us he thinks war is a sin !
Sinwar and the head of Hamas’s military wing, Mohammed Deif, are said to be the masterminds behind the October 7 attack on southern Israel.
Plus, those on Israel's side that allowed the attack to happen.
You can kiss any "negotiations" or "peace deals" good-bye – not that they ever had any chance with Netanyahu on the other side, anyway. There is zero motivation for either side to engage in that since Netanyahu can't afford to and Hamas is winning, not to mention that if Hamas continues Israel will end up destroyed and Palestine will finally be free.
So good news all around. Now all we're waiting for is the wider war to finally kick off and finish off Israel and drive the US out of the Middle East forever.