Benjamin Netanyahu says Israeli army killed Hamas Gaza chief Mohammed Sinwar

Hamas has yet to confirm his death

Mohammed Sinwar was targeted in Israeli air strikes in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis on May 13. Photo: IDF

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Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday that the army had killed Mohammed Sinwar, the leader of Hamas in Gaza and the younger brother of the group's late leader Yahya Sinwar.

Israeli media had reported that Mr Sinwar was the target of air strikes in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis on May 13. The Israeli army said it conducted "a precise strike on Hamas terrorists in a command and control centre located in an underground terrorist infrastructure site beneath the European hospital in Khan Younis".

"In 600 days of the War of Revival, we have indeed changed the face of the Middle East," Mr Netanyahu said, confirming the death to the Israeli parliament. "We eliminated Mohammed Deif, [Ismail] Haniyeh, Yahya Sinwar and Mohammed Sinwar."

"In the last two days we have been in a dramatic turn towards a complete defeat of Hamas," he said. He added that Israel was also "taking control of food distribution" in Gaza, a reference to the start of operations by a US and Israeli-backed group.

Hamas has yet to confirm Mohammed Sinwar's death. He was elevated to the top ranks of the Palestinian militant group last year after Israel killed his older brother in combat in October last year.

The scene of Israeli air strikes on the European Hospital in Khan Younis, southern Gaza, on May 13. Reuters

Yahya Sinwar masterminded the October 7, 2023 attack on Israel that triggered the war in Gaza, now in its 20th month. He was later named the overall leader of the group after Israel assassinated his predecessor, Ismail Haniyeh, in Iran.

Known for clandestine operations, Mohammed Sinwar played a central role in planning and executing the October 2023 attack, Hamas sources said. The attack, in which Hamas and allied militants groups killed about 1,200 people and took about 250 hostage, is considered Israel's worst security failure.

He was also widely believed to have been one of the masterminds of the 2006 cross-border attack and abduction of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.

Hamas held Mr Shalit for five years before he was swapped for more than 1,000 Palestinians jailed by Israel, one of whom was Yahya Sinwar.

Following the killing of Hamas’s top military commander, Mohammad Deif, in July last year, Mohammed Sinwar took charge of the group’s military wing.

After his older brother's death, he became the de facto leader of the militant group in the Gaza Strip.

Mohammed Sinwar was born in the Khan Younis refugee camp on September 16, 1975. His family had fled from Al Majdal Asqalan (Ashkelon) during the 1948 Arab–Israeli War.

He joined Hamas in 1991 and was arrested by Israel in the same year for suspected terrorism, spending less than a year in custody. He was also jailed by the Palestinian Authority in Ramallah during the 1990s. In 2005, he became the commander of Hamas's Khan Younis Brigade.