Yahya Sinwar was one of Hamas’s most influential leaders, wielding outsize power while remaining mostly hidden in tunnels beneath Gaza.
Israel’s military said on Thursday that he had been killed in Gaza.
Long considered a planner of Hamas’s military strategy in Gaza, Sinwar consolidated his power when he was chosen in August to lead the group’s political office as well. He was elevated to that post after the assassination of the group’s political chief, Ismail Haniyeh.
Formative years
Sinwar was born in Gaza in 1962 to a family that had fled its home, along with several hundred thousand other Palestinian Arabs who fled or were forced to flee during the wars surrounding the creation of the state of Israel. This displacement deeply influenced his decision to join Hamas in the 1980s.
Sinwar had been recruited by Hamas’s founder, Sheik Ahmed Yassin, who made him chief of an internal security unit known as Al Majd. His job was to find and punish those suspected of violating Islamic morality laws or co-operating with the Israeli occupiers, a position that eventually landed him in trouble with Israeli authorities.
[ Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar is dead, says Israeli foreign ministerOpens in new window ]
Life in prison
Sinwar was imprisoned in 1988 for murdering four Palestinians whom he accused of apostasy or collaborating with Israel, according to Israeli court records. He spent more than two decades in prison in Israel, where he learned Hebrew and developed an understanding of Israeli culture and society.
While incarcerated, Sinwar took advantage of an online university programme and devoured Israeli news.
Sinwar once told an Italian journalist that prison is a crucible. “Prison builds you,” he said, adding that it gave him time to reflect on what he believed in and the price he would be willing to pay for it.
He tried to escape from custody several times, once digging a hole in his cell floor in hopes of tunnelling under the prison and exiting through the visitor centre. And he found ways to plot against Israel with Hamas leaders on the outside, managing to smuggle cell phones into the prison and use lawyers and visitors to ferry messages out, including about finding ways to kidnap Israeli soldiers to trade for Palestinian prisoners.
These activities foreshadowed the approach he would take years later when planning the October 7th attack on Israel.
After prison
When he was released from Israeli prison in a prisoner swap in 2011, Sinwar said that the capture of Israeli soldiers was, after years of failed negotiations, the proven tactic for freeing Palestinians incarcerated by Israel.
After his release from prison, Sinwar married and had children. He said little in public about his family but once remarked that “the first words my son spoke were ‘father,’ ‘mother’ and ‘drone’.”
His hard-line stance suggested that he was not eager to reach a ceasefire agreement with Israel that would end the fighting in Gaza and lead to the return of hostages, living and dead, taken from Israel who are still being held in Gaza.
What does his death mean for ceasefire negotiations?
The death of Sinwar raises hopes of an end to the conflict. Both Sinwar and the Israeli government had refused to compromise during the months-long negotiations for a truce.
His death could either prompt Hamas to agree to some of Israel’s demands – or provide Binyamin Netanyahu, the Israeli prime minister, with a symbolic victory that would give him the political cover he needs to soften his own negotiating stance.
Since the war began, most ceasefire talks have taken place in Egypt and Qatar. But Sinwar still played a principal role, even from his hideout in Gaza. Throughout the talks, Sinwar’s consent was required by Hamas’s negotiators before they agreed to any concessions, according to officials familiar with the talks.
While Hamas officials have previously insisted that Sinwar did not have the final say in the group’s decisions, his leadership role in Gaza and his forceful personality gave him outsize importance in how Hamas operates, according to allies and foes alike.
“There’s no decision that can be made without consulting Sinwar,” said Salah al-Din al-Awawdeh, a Hamas member and political analyst who befriended Sinwar while they were both jailed in Israel during the 1990s and 2000s. “Sinwar isn’t an ordinary leader. He’s a powerful person and an architect of events,” al-Awawdeh added. – This article originally appeared in the New York Times
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