ISRAEL has again vowed to destroy Hamas boss Yahya Sinwar after he was named de facto leader of the terrorist group.
Sinwar, nicknamed the “Bin Laden of Gaza,” masterminded the horrific October 7 massacre in Israel last year that killed more than 1,000 people.
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Head of the group in Gaza since 2017, he came under attack following the alleged Israeli assassination of Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’ political chief, last week.
Haniyeh was in Iran’s capital Tehran for the inauguration of its new president, staying at a military complex in the north of the city.
In the early hours of July 31, he and his bodyguard were killed while they slept.
After days of negotiations by the terrorist group Hamas in Doha, Qatar, they named Sinwar, 61, as his replacement.
Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesman Daniel Hagari responded: “There is only one place for him, and that place is alongside Muhammad Daf and all the terrorists responsible for Shiva in October.
“This is the only place we have prepared and designated for him,” he told Saudi Al-Arabiya news channel.
The IDF revealed last week how an earlier airstrike on July 13 destroyed Mohammed Deif, another Hamas boss, in Khan Younis in the southern Strip.
A Hamas statement said: “The Hamas Islamic Resistance Movement announces the selection of Commander Yahya Sinwar as head of the movement’s political bureau, succeeding the martyred Commander Ismail Haniyeh.”
The last surviving man, Sinwar, spent half his adult life in Israeli prisons, has a reputation as a ruthless leader and is now the most powerful target remaining on Israel’s kill list.
He prevented Israeli assassination in Gaza for nearly 10 months.
The terror boss is believed to be hiding in tunnels beneath the city, used to evade the IDF, transport weapons and even hold hostages.
Israel has long promised to eliminate all members of Hamas, despite the civilian guarantee in the Gaza Strip.
Around 1,200 Israelis and foreigners were killed and 250 taken hostage in the heinous attack in October last year.
Since then, horrific violence in Gaza has resulted in the deaths of nearly 40,000 Palestinians, according to the Health Ministry and the UN body in the Hamas-run enclave.
Most of the Strip was also destroyed by fighting and airstrikes, displacing around two million people from their homes.
Many Israelis have pressed the Netanyahu regime for a deal that will see the 115 hostages remaining alive in Gaza return home.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Tuesday that Sinwar needs to agree to a ceasefire agreement in his new role.
Haniyeh, as the group’s political head, was previously responsible for leading ceasefire and hostage negotiations.
Although Sinwar has long been recognized as a powerful figure in Hamas who would have the final say in any negotiations from his post in Gaza, Reuters reports.
Following Haniyeh’s assassination, fears were raised that any potential deals on the table could be stalled as a result.
Blinken told the press: “[Sinwar] He was and continues to be the main decision-maker when it comes to concluding the ceasefire.
“And so I think this just underlines the fact that it’s really up to him to decide whether to move forward with a ceasefire that will manifestly help so many Palestinians in desperate need.”
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Rising tensions in the Middle East
By Ellie Doughty, Foreign News Reporter
Tensions in the Middle East have long been a fluctuating and dangerous area of global concern.
The conflict between Israel and Palestine in the Gaza Strip, the West Bank and on Israeli territory itself is nothing new.
Iran and Israel have also been in conflict for a long time.
But after a brutal Hamas terrorist attack on Israeli soil in October last year, things entered a new phase.
Israel reacted like never before, unleashing nearly ten months of ground war and airstrikes on the decimated enclave in an attempt to destroy Hamas and rescue its hostages.
The Iranian-backed terrorist group killed around 1,200 Israelis and kidnapped 250 more in the heinous October 7 massacre.
The UN estimates that at least 39,000 people have been killed in Gaza since the new war broke out.
This number includes data from the Gaza Ministry of Health, which is under the control of Hamas and has raised concerns from authorities about its accuracy.
Now, after nearly ten months of war in Gaza, tensions appear to have reached a new level following a series of deadly attacks and high-profile killings in late July and early August.
On Saturday, July 27, a rocket attack fired from southern Lebanon hit a football field in the Golan Heights – a Druze village occupied by Israel – killing 12 young people, including children.
Both Israel and the US said Hezbollah, the largest of Iran’s proxy terrorist groups, which operates from Lebanon, was responsible for the deadly attack.
On Monday, July 28, the IDF launched an airstrike in an area of Beirut, the capital of Lebanon, killing Hezbollah’s most senior military commander, Fuad Shukr.
Less than two days later, at around 2 a.m. on Wednesday, July 30, Israel killed Hamas’ top political leader, Ismail Haniyeh, while he slept in Iran’s capital, Tehran.
Israel has not yet explicitly claimed responsibility for the attack, but after promising to eliminate all of Hamas last year, they are believed to be behind it.
US officials have also said they suspect Israel of being behind the killing.
On the morning of Thursday, August 1, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced that an attack on Khan Younis in southern Gaza killed Mohammed Deif on July 13.
Dief had worked as head of Hamas’ ruthless military wing, the al-Qassam brigades, since 2002.
It marked another major loss for Iran’s proxy terrorist groups in the region.
Early reports this week suggested that Ismail Haniyeh was shot down in a precision strike, when a rocket was fired from a drone outside his window and detonated inside the room.
Then a New York Times investigation suggested that a bomb had been planted in his room at the military complex where he was staying and detonated remotely.
Unnamed Iranian officials also shared the explosive theory with The Telegraph, further confusing the murky details surrounding Haniyeh’s death.
The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) concluded its investigation into the humiliating security breach on Saturday, August 1, and said he died after a “short-range projectile” was fired from outside the building.
A statement broadcast on Iranian state TV said a 7kg rocket warhead was used in the attack.
Iran and its proxy groups; Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthis in Yemen have vowed to take revenge on Israel for Haniyeh’s murder.
Then, on the night of Saturday, August 3, Hezbollah fired about 30 rockets from Lebanon toward Galilee in northern Israel.
Tel Aviv’s impressive Iron Dome Defense system went into action, destroying “most” of the missiles and no one was injured.
But the UK, US and France have urged all their citizens to evacuate Lebanon as fears of a wider war breaking out in the region continue to rise.
This story originally appeared on The-sun.com read the full story
