7 August 2024: Palestinian resistance group Hamas says it has chosen Yahya Sinwar, its top official in Gaza, as the new leader of its political bureau, reports Al Jazeera.
The selection of Sinwar follows Ismail Haniyeh’s assassination in Tehran on July 31, the Palestinian group said on Tuesday.
“The Islamic Resistance Movement Hamas announces the selection of Commander Yahya Sinwar as the head of the political bureau of the movement, succeeding the martyr Commander Ismail Haniyeh, may [God] have mercy on him,” the group said in a brief statement.
Sinwar, 61, is seen by Israel as the mastermind behind the October 7 attack by Hamas inside Israeli territory, in which more than 1,100 people were killed and more than 200 others taken captive.
Israel’s subsequent military campaign in Gaza has killed nearly 40,000 Palestinians, thousands of them women and children, displaced almost its entire 2.3 million population, and caused an unprecedented humanitarian crisis with widespread starvation and health emergencies.
The Israeli assault has also come with reports of systematic rights abuses, such as the torture of Palestinians in captivity.
Haniyeh’s assassination, almost certainly carried out by Israel, sent shockwaves through the region and was seen by many as an effort by the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to scuttle efforts to negotiate a ceasefire, in which Haniyeh was a key figure.
Analysts have said his replacement by Sinwar, who has gone largely unseen since the October 7 attack, was an indicator of the central place that Gaza occupies in the group’s political vision.
