Israeli troops on Saturday were hunting a Hamas commander described as Palestine’s Osama bin Laden, vowing to find him wherever he was hiding and insisting his days were numbered.
Yahya Sinwar, 60, is the current head of Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
He has been arrested by Israel multiple times and spent 24 years in Israeli prisons: he was freed in 2011, as part of a prisoner swap in exchange for Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit.
Sinwar is being held responsible for the murder of 1,300 Israelis in the October 7 attack. The U.S. death toll rose to 29 on Saturday, with 15 missing, believed to be held hostage inside Gaza.
‘Yahya Sinwar is the face of evil,’ said Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, a spokesman for the IDF.
‘He is the mastermind behind this, like bin Laden was.
‘He built his career on murdering Palestinians when he understood they were collaborators. That’s how he became known as the butcher of Khan Younis [in southern Gaza].’
Yahya Sinwar is pictured in April 2022 speaking at a meeting in Gaza City. He has been described as the mastermind of the October 7 terror attack
Sinwar was likened to Osama bin Laden, the al-Qaeda leader killed by U.S. Navy SEALS in May 2011
Lt. Col. Richard Hecht, a spokesman for the IDF, said that Sinwar was their bin Laden
The death toll has topped 1,000 in Israel as the country plots a bloody revenge on the people of Gaza
Hecht said that Israeli troops would not rest until he was found and killed.
‘That man and his whole team are in our sights. We will get to that man,’ he said, adding: ‘This could be long.’
Sinwar was designated a terrorist by the United States in 2015.
On Saturday, Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh met with Iran’s foreign minister, Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, in Qatar.
Iran is a supporter of Hamas, but its direct involvement in the terror attack remains disputed.
It does not exercise the same operational control over Hamas as it does over Hezbollah, based in Lebanon.
Troops remove the bodies of victims, killed during an attack by Hamas terrorists in Kfar Aza, on Tuesday
Hamas left a trail of devastation at a series of kibbutzes near the border with Gaza, including children’s beds soaked in blood
IDF Lotar unit soldiers are slowly checking the Kfar Aza kibbutz, passing from one house to another to clear them from any ammunition or threat. It was here that Hamas terrorists massacred families in their homes
A house is completely destroyed after being burned by Hamas terrorists during the attack at Kibbutz Be’eri, near the border with Gaza on October 11, 2023 in Be’eri, Israel
An Israeli soldier breaks down in tears at the sight of a family dining table on which there is still Challah bread from Friday’s Kiddush at the Kfar Aza kibbutz. Hamas terrorists massacred families here on Saturday
Since the Hamas incursion, the bloodiest single day in Israel’s 75-year history, the Israeli military says it has mobilized 360,000 reservists.
On Saturday, two U.S. sources told CNN that a second carrier strike group is moving to the region, after the first – led by the USS Gerald R. Ford – arrived off the coast of Israel earlier this week.
The USS Dwight D. Eisenhower strike group will join the Ford, having changed its plans to move toward the US European Command and deployed instead to the Middle East, leaving its Norfolk, Virginia, base on Friday.
The U.S. warships are not intended to join the fighting in Gaza or take part in Israel’s operations, Pentagon officials stress.
But the presence of two of the Navy’s most powerful ships is designed to send a message of deterrence to Iran and Iranian proxies in the region, such as Hezbollah in Lebanon.
The USS Gerald R. Ford is the world’s largest aircraft carrier. It is now off the coast of Israel
‘Merkava’ battle tanks muster today at a gathering site at an undisclosed location along the border with Gaza
Addressing a Human Rights Campaign dinner Saturday in Washington, President Joe Biden linked the humanitarian crisis in Gaza to different versions of hate that he said must be stopped.
‘A week ago we saw hate manifest another way in the worst massacre of the Jewish people since the Holocaust,’ Biden said, citing the 1,300 lives lost in Israel as well as ‘children, grandparents alike kidnapped, held hostage by Hamas.’
‘The humanitarian crisis in Gaza – innocent Palestinian families and the vast majority that have nothing to do with Hamas – they’re being used as human shields,’ he said.
‘We have to reject hate in every form.’
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