Un new Hamas leader killed by IDF. Yahya Sinouar, political leader of Hamas since the death of Ismaïl Haniyeh, was eliminated during an operation in the Gaza Strip, Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz announced this Thursday, October 17. “Mass murderer Yahya Sinouar, responsible for the massacre and atrocities of October 7, was eliminated by soldiers [des forces israéliennes] “, he said in a press release.
His death was confirmed by the Israeli army, which with the internal intelligence services, “confirms that after a year-long hunt, yesterday [mercredi]On October 16, 2024, Israeli army soldiers eliminated Yahya Sinouar, the leader of the terrorist organization Hamas during an operation in the southern Gaza Strip.
Earlier in the afternoon, the Israeli army announced that it was carrying out checks after the death of three terrorists during operations in the Gaza Strip. The three “targets” were in a building which did not appear to house any hostages, the army said in a statement. Since then, DNA tests have been underway. Dental photographs were notably submitted to the police forensic laboratory and were subject to DNA tests, police reported to Agence France-Presse (AFP).
“The opportunity to free the hostages”
The announcement of Yahya Sinouar’s death was welcomed by the Israeli president, for whom the Palestinian leader was “responsible for heinous acts of terrorism”. “Now, more than ever, we must act by all means possible to bring back the 101 hostages who are still being held in horrific conditions by Hamas terrorists in Gaza,” Isaac Herzog said in a statement published on X.
For the head of diplomacy Israel Katz, this death is “an opportunity” to free the hostages. It “opens the way for profound change in Gaza: without Hamas and without the control of Iran,” he said in a statement. Benyamin Netanyahu believes, for his part, that the death of Sinouar is “an important step” in the decline of Hamas. “Evil has taken a severe blow,” he said at a press conference Thursday evening, but the war “is not yet over.”ALSO READ Death of Yahya Sinouar, the man who ruined the Palestinian cause
According to the leader of the American House of Representatives, the death of the Hamas leader is a “source of hope” in the conflict between Israel and the terrorist group. “His death brings hope to all those who seek to live in freedom, and relief to the Israelis he sought to oppress,” Republican Mike Johnson said in a statement.
Berlin also reacted in a press release, calling on Hamas to “lay down its arms” and free the hostages after the death of this “cruel assassin”. “As the instigator of the October 7 terror, he caused the death of thousands of people and immeasurable suffering for an entire region,” wrote the head of German diplomacy Annalena Baerbock in a statement. “The suffering of the people of Gaza must finally end. »
DNA analyzes carried out
According to Israeli military radio, the three men, including Yahya Sinouar, were killed during a ground operation in Rafah, in the south of the Palestinian enclave, and their bodies taken away by the military. DNA analyzes were carried out, the Israeli authorities having fingerprints of the Palestinian leader, imprisoned for many years in Israel before being released in 2011 as part of an exchange of detainees.
Yahya Sinouar, considered the mastermind of the deadly attacks of October 7, 2023 against northern Israel, succeeded in August as head of Hamas from Ismaïl Haniyeh, killed in Tehran on July 31 in an explosion blamed on Israel. His death has not yet been confirmed by Hamas.
