Jon B. Alterman
The Israeli government announced today that its soldiers had killed Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar in a firefight in southern Gaza. Sinwar had led Hamas in Gaza since 2017, and he was elected the chairman of the Hamas political bureau in August 2024. Sinwar was a hardliner who felt Palestinians were too conciliatory toward Israel. He was the mastermind of Hamas’s October 7, 2023, attack on Israel, and he was thought to have been hiding underground for much of the time since.
Q1: Does Yahya Sinwar’s death mean the end of the war in Gaza?
A1: The war in Gaza is not over, but it has moved to a new phase. Hamas will be fractured as a fighting force, and some groups within Hamas are likely to want to double down on violence while others may seek to preserve options for the future. For security reasons, Sinwar was not directing daily operations, so we shouldn’t expect Hamas’s capacity to quickly degrade. Sinwar seemed strongly opposed to compromise, so his death makes some sort of settlement more possible. At the same time, the lack of a single credible Hamas leader means it will be hard to push some parts of the organization toward a ceasefire. Overall, levels of fighting against Israel are likely to diminish in the coming days. Still, we are likely to see some sort of leadership struggle within Hamas. That could turn the group’s violence inward for a time, and comprehensively ending the war in Gaza is likely some way off.
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