New Hamas leader Sinwar has nothing to lose

Once Israeli doctors saved his life, he spent decades in prison and now Jihia Sinwar is the political leader of Hamas. What would it take for an October 7 mastermind to lead a terror group from an underground hideout?

Two days after Ismail Haniyeh was killed in an attack in Tehran, Hamas officials in Doha held talks over the succession of their political leader. Several options were discussed, the BBC reported, but ultimately the choice fell on the most famous and most notorious figure: Jihia Shinwar, formerly the head of a terror group in the Gaza Strip and, according to Israel, the mastermind of the October attacks. 7th.

A change in leadership does not initially change Israel’s priorities. After Shinwar’s promotion on October 7, the Israeli military described him as a “dead man walking”.

But the hunt for Sinwar is difficult for Israel. While the Gaza Strip resembles a desert of rubble, Sinwar leads Hamas from underground. He has not been seen in public since October 7, but has mostly been hiding in an elaborate tunnel system under the coastline. When the army overran Chinwar’s hometown of San Yunis in February, it distributed footage of an abandoned underground shelter with a bathroom, kitchen and cash safe where Chinwar allegedly lived with his family.

Haniya was considered a pragmatist

This situation distinguishes him from his predecessor Hanija, who lived a comfortable life in Qatar’s capital Doha until his death. Hanija was received in Istanbul by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and traveled to Tehran for the inauguration of Iranian President Massoud Beseshkian, which ultimately proved his downfall. Among diplomats, Hanija was considered a pragmatist and relatively moderate. “They killed Haniya, a flexible person who was open to solutions. Now they have to deal with Sinwar and the military leadership,” the BBC quoted a Hamas official as saying.

Although Haniya is Hamas’s official number one, Shinwar always had the last word, according to US intelligence agencies, the New York Times reports. His uncompromising stance in the negotiations on the Gaza war is a major reason why an agreement has yet to be reached. According to the New Yorker magazine, Sinwar must communicate only through notes and messengers for fear of being monitored by the Israeli military. Sometimes it takes days for Chinwar’s approval or disapproval to reach the negotiators.

Despite his prominent position in Hamas, Shinwar’s choice was not given. In the past, the terror group has been careful to exile its Politburo leadership to remain active even during attacks on Gaza. According to the “Neue Zürcher Zeitung”, the referendum in Doha preceded the civil strife. Former Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal reportedly tried to prevent Sinwar from being elected. According to the report, Mashal wants to reduce Iranian influence in Hamas and leans more towards the Gulf states, but has been defeated by pro-Iranian forces in the leadership ranks. Now all power is concentrated in Sinwar. A man with nothing to lose.

Born in a refugee camp

The 61-year-old has devoted his life to fighting Israel. His parents were from Ashkelon in what is now Israel. The 1948 Arab-Israeli War and the resulting mass exodus of hundreds of thousands of Palestinians turned them into refugees. Sinwar grew up in a refugee camp in Gaza, studied Arabic at university and was jailed for the first time at the age of 19 for “Islamic activities”.

Sinwar was a first-generation member of Hamas, and the two maintained a close relationship until the death of its founder, Ahmed Yassin. In the 1980s, he commanded an internal security department that tracked down and ruthlessly punished those who collaborated with the Israeli occupiers. This earned Chinwar his nickname that still resonates today: “The Butcher of San Eunice.”

During this time Sinwar was responsible for several “brutal murders”, Israeli journalist Ehud Yari, who interviewed him four times, told the BBC. “Some of them with his own hands, he was proud of them and talked about them to me and others.” In 1988, Israel sentenced him to four life sentences for the murder of several Palestinians and the planned kidnapping of Israeli soldiers. According to court documents obtained by The New Yorker, he already saw it as an effective means of freeing Palestinian prisoners in Israel.

A “strange, complex figure”

While Sinwar was in prison, the Israeli government evaluated his character. The BBC cites him as “brutal, authoritarian, influential and possessing unusual skills of tolerance, cunning and manipulation and understatement”. He also has the ability to captivate a crowd. Journalist Yari is convinced that Sinwar is a psychopath. But let’s just say, “Chinver is a psychopath, period.” You’d overlook this strange, complex figure because it’s wrong.” Sinwar is “very sly and witty—knowing how to turn on and off a kind of personal charm.”

According to former prison employee Betty Lahat, Sinwar became radicalized in prison, became a spokesperson for imprisoned Palestinians and became violent towards fellow inmates. He studied Israeli culture and history intensively, learning fluent Hebrew and memorizing portions of the Torah. According to the New Yorker, he considered prison an “academy” where he could learn the psychology of his enemy.

“He is a very intelligent person who has invested in his intellectual development and a deep understanding of Israeli society,” Lahat told the Israeli newspaper Maariv. “He set up groups in prison to listen to all Israeli radio and television stations and follow politicians. They listened to political analyzes and diplomatic assessments.”

When Sinwar developed cancer while in captivity, Israeli doctors removed his brain tumor. Lahat asked him if he was grateful for that. So he replied that it was their job to take care of him. In 2011, he was quickly released after 24 years – as one of 1,027 Palestinians exchanged by Israel as a soldier in the Gaza Strip.

“We’ll Come to You”

Back in Gaza, he married, had two children and had a distinguished career in the Hamas power apparatus. In 2015, the United States added him to its terrorist list, and in 2017 he became the military leader of Hamas in the Gaza Strip. He initially used politically contradictory rhetoric, talking about reconciliation with Fatah in the West Bank and “peaceful popular resistance” by Hamas.

At the same time, Sinwar never shied away from seeing extremism and terrorism as the preferred means. At a rally in the Gaza Strip in December 2022, he said: “We will come at you with endless rockets, we will come at you with an unlimited flood of soldiers, we will come at you with millions of our people as we have done over and over again. Wave.”

The terrorist attack, which Hamas calls the “al-Aqsa flood,” killed more than 1,100 people on October 7. Not only was Sinwar the architect of the massacre, but he apparently anticipated the Israeli reaction. Citing Israeli and US intelligence officials, the New York Times reported that his strategy was to continue the war in Gaza until it damaged Israel’s international reputation and damaged its relationship with its most important ally, the United States.

Israel’s public enemy number one already knows that Sinwar will be killed even if the war ends. A Hamas official told the BBC his election was intended to send a “message of rebellion to Israel”. Minutes after the announcement, Hamas’ military wing said it had fired rockets into Israel from the Gaza Strip.