Muhammad Deif, a Top Hamas Commander, Is Dead, Israel Says

[Pelican Press 0]

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Muhammad Deif, a Top ****** Commander, Is *****, ******* Says

The ******** military said on Thursday that it had ******* Muhammad Deif, the elusive commander of ******’s military wing who has long been one of the country’s most wanted militants. He was widely seen as one of the chief architects of the ******-led Oct. 7 ******* on *******.

The announcement culminated weeks of speculation about the fate of Mr. Deif after an airstrike on July 13 on the outskirts of Khan Younis, in southern Gaza, that targeted him. At the time, the ******** military did not say for certain whether he had been *******. ****** has not explicitly confirmed or denied *******’s claim on Thursday.

“Following an intelligence assessment, it can be confirmed that Muhammad Deif was eliminated in the strike,” the ******** military statement said, without offering any more specific evidence that he was *****.

At least 90 people on the ground in the vicinity of the strike were ******* that day, according to the Gazan health ministry. Its tally does not distinguish between civilians and combatants, but health officials said some were women and children.

Mr. Deif, who survived several previous ******** ************** attempts, has been the No. 2 ****** leader inside Gaza. He is the highest-ranking ****** figure inside Gaza that ******* says it has ******* since Oct. 7.

*******’s government made eliminating ******’s leadership a stated goal of the war, and Mr. Deif’s ****** would be counted as a victory in that effort. How ******’s operations could be affected ******** to be seen, though: ******* has ******* many senior commanders in the past, only to see the group swiftly replace them.

The announcement came a day after the ************** of Ismail Haniyeh, the Qatar-based leader of ******’s political bureau. He was ******* in an ********** in the Iranian capital, Tehran. Both ****** and Iran blamed *******, which has not confirmed or denied its involvement.

An undated handout photo reportedly shows Muhammad Deif, the chief of Al-Qassam Brigades, the military wing of the ************ militant group ******. Mr. Deif had survived multiple ******** attempts on his life.Credit…Agence France-Presse — Getty Images

Mr. Deif has been de facto second in command to the group’s leader inside Gaza, Yahya Sinwar.

Born in 1965 to a poor ************ family, Mr. Deif grew up in the Khan Younis ******** camp and joined ****** as a young man, around the time the group was founded in the late 1980s.

He quickly rose through the organization’s ranks, developed a reputation as a master ***** maker and orchestrated a number of attacks on *******, including a series of deadly bus bombings that undermined the ********-************ peace process in the mid-1990s.

Analysts credit him with transforming ******’s military wing, the Qassam Brigades, into a powerful and well-organized fighting force with tens of thousands in its ranks.

Mr. Deif’s success at escaping previous ******** efforts to ***** him — he was believed to have lost an eye and been seriously wounded — only enhanced his status in the eyes of some ************ admirers.

He survived more than eight attempts on his life, according to ******** intelligence. In 2014, an ******** airstrike ******* one of his wives and at least one of his children, an infant son. In a brief 2021 conflict in Gaza, *******’s military said it had tried to ***** him several times.

When the Oct. 7 ******* on ******* was underway, Mr. Deif released a recorded speech saying that ****** had launched the ******** so that “the ****** will understand that the time of their rampaging without accountability has ended.”

Since October, ******* has again had Mr. Deif in its cross hairs, ******** his deputy, Marwan Issa, in March.

In May, Karim Khan, the International ********* Court’s chief prosecutor, requested a warrant for Mr. Deif’s arrest, accusing him and two other ****** leaders of war ******* and ******* against humanity. The prosecutor also sought arrest warrants for *******’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and its defense minister, Yoav Gallant.

****** criticized Mr. Khan for seeking to prosecute its leaders alongside ******** officials, which it deemed “equating between the ************ and the victim.”

Mr. Deif spent decades underground in the tunnel network that typically shields ****** leaders, according to ******** intelligence officials, and had not been seen publicly in years. But officials recently said the ******** military believed that he had developed health problems that forced him to spend more time above ground.

The strike that the ******** military said ******* him was authorized after prolonged surveillance of a house in southern Gaza where another top ****** lieutenant, Rafa Salameh, was believed to be staying with his family, according to ******** officials.

After learning that Mr. Deif appeared to be at the location, ******** fighter jets struck with at least five precision-guided ******, the officials said. ******* has said Mr. Salameh was also *******, a claim ****** has not directly addressed.

That evening, Mr. Netanyahu said that an airstrike had targeted Mr. Deif but that there was not yet “absolute certainty” as to whether he had been *******.

“His hands are steeped in the blood of many Israelis,” Mr. Netanyahu said. “At the beginning of the campaign, I ***** down a rule: The ****** murderers are ***** men, from the first to the last.”

Cassandra Vinograd and Rawan Sheikh Ahmad contributed reporting.

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