This is the moment visibly bloodied Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar feebly throws a stick to defend himself against an IDF drone just seconds before he was assassinated by Israeli forces in Gaza.
Footage captured on the remotely-controlled machine shows Sinwar, who Israel held chiefly responsible for the ‘massacre and atrocities of October 7’, almost camouflaged amid the rubble of a shelled-out building.
But towards the back of what was once a living room area, the drone hones in on Israel’s premier target sitting on a dust-laden chair, his head covered in a scarf to hide his identity.
Sinwar can be seen looking directly at the drone, peaking only through the small gap in the wrapping encasing his face, with his right hand wounded by bullets.
In his left hand, he briefly holds aloft a stick before lobbing it slowly towards the drone.
The footage ends, with Israeli forces fatally striking the building moments later.
Drone Footage showing the Leader of Hamas, Yahya Sinwar armed with a Stick and hiding behind several Chairs on the Second Floor of a Building, right before his Elimination. pic.twitter.com/a3tOcfFXWV
— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) October 17, 2024
IDF spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, confirmed the Hamas leader had died and released the footage hours after the assassination took place, The Jerusalem Post reports.
During a press conference on Thursday, he said a drone had identified three terrorists, who were fleeing between buildings in Gaza.
He said: ‘Sinwar fled alone into one of the buildings.
‘Sinwar, who was injured in his hand by gunfire, can be seen here with his face covered, in his final moments, throwing a wooden plank at the drone.
‘We identified him as a terrorist inside a building, fired at the building, and then went in to search.
‘We found him with a vest, a pistol, and 40,000 shekels. He was on the run, fleeing, and our forces eliminated him.’
Hagari added: ‘Sinwar was responsible for the most brutal attack against Israel in our history when terrorists from Gaza invaded Israel, massacred Israelis in their homes, raped our women, burned entire families alive and took over 250 men, women and children, babies, hostage to Gaza.
‘For the past year, Sinwar tried to escape justice. He failed. We said we would find him and bring him to justice, and we did.
‘It was Yahya Sinwar who decided to wage war with Israel while hiding behind civilians in Gaza.’
He added that 101 hostages still remain in captivity in ‘brutal conditions’.
Israel’s foreign minister also confirmed the news on Thursday.
‘Mass murderer Yahya Sinwar, who was responsible for the massacre and atrocities of October 7, was killed today by IDF soldiers,’ Israel Katz said in a statement.
He said Sinwar’s death was ‘a great military and moral achievement for Israel’, adding that his death opens the possibility for the ‘immediate release of the hostages’ and change ‘that will lead to a new reality in Gaza’ without Hamas or Iranian ‘control’.
Troops reported identifying a group of terrorists in a building at an undisclosed location in Gaza. After an exchange of fire, a tank shell was said to have hit the structure and collapsed it.
Graphic images circulated online purporting to show the body of the Hamas leader with Israeli soldiers surrounding it.
David H. Petraeus, former Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, said the killing of Yahya Sinwar was ‘bigger’ than the killing of al-Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden in 2011.
Speaking to the PM programme on Radio 4 he said: ‘It is hard to overstate how important this is’.
‘This is bigger than Osama Bin Laden, who was massively symbolic but not that operational…
‘This is both hugely symbolic, he was after all the complete leader of Hamas… but also hugely operational.’
Sinwar had been a prime target for Israeli forces since October 7, but Israel had allegedly been hesitant to make an assassination attempt amid reports he was surrounded by Israeli hostages and was carrying a bag packed with explosives.
It is believed that Sinwar had been moving from place to place without the hostages since the end of August, when six abductees – Carmel Gat, Hirsch Goldberg-Poulin, Alex Lubnov, Almog Sarosi, Uri Danino and the late Aden Yerushalmi – were found dead in a tunnel, according to a new report by N12.
Israeli troops reported no sign of hostages at the location where he was killed today.
Israel reported earlier it was carrying out dental and DNA testing to ascertain whether Sinwar was among the victims of the strike.
Israeli police told the BBC that Sinwar’s body was identified through dental records and fingerprints.
Sinwar was imprisoned in Israel for 22 years.
US President Joe Biden was also briefed by senior aides on Sinwar’s possible death earlier today, a White House official has said.
When asked whether the UK government would want to see action in Gaza scaled down if Sinwar was confirmed dead, a Number 10 spokeswoman said: ‘We stand by their right to self-defence and to prevent such a terror attack from ever happening again.
‘As you know, Hamas is a proscribed terrorist organisation.’
She added that the government’s ‘priorities’ continue to be securing a ceasefire, getting more aid into Gaza and ensuring the release of Israeli hostages.
British defence secretary John Healey said ahead of the announcement of Sinwar’s death: ‘I for one, will not mourn the death of a terror leader like Sinwar – someone who was responsible for the terror attack on October 7.’
Sinwar is widely considered to be the chief architect the October 7 attacks on Israel, which saw 1,200 people killed and 250 taken hostage by Hamas and other terror groups, according to Israeli tallies.
Following the massacre, IDF spokesman Lt. Col. Richard Hecht vowed that Israeli troops would not rest until he was found and killed, and declared him a ‘dead man walking’.
Sinwar had remained elusive throughout the year-long war in Gaza, hiding in the Hamas tunnel network beneath the Strip.
The only apparent glimpse of him came in a video filmed just a couple of days after the bloody conflict erupted.
The black and white images, uncovered by IDF troops during a raid earlier this year, show a man believed to be Sinwar making his way through a tunnel along with his wife and three children, while carrying a large bag.
‘In that bag is about 25kg of dynamite. Around him are at least 20 hostages,’ according to Kobi Michael, Sinwar’s former Shin Bet interrogator.
‘A few times we have had the chance to kill him, but if we do, he will kill all the hostages around him.’
Sinwar became the Iran-backed Palestinian group’s new leader after the killing of its former political chief Ismail Haniyeh in July.
Hamas and Iran blame Israel for Haniyeh’s killing in an attack in Tehran, but Israel has not commented on it.
Israel’s announcement on Sinwar comes weeks after it assassinated Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah in a massive strike in Lebanon, where its military has escalated a war since late September.
A slew of other Iran-backed militant commanders have also been killed in recent months.
Israel said earlier this year that it had killed Mohammed Deif, Hamas’s military chief, in a strike, though the Palestinian group has not confirmed it.
Deif stood accused of working with Sinwar to plan the October 7 attack.
With Hamas massively weakened more than a year into the Gaza war, Sinwar’s death, if confirmed, would deal a seismic blow to the organisation.
