Yahya Sinuar is dead and this is Benjamin Netanyahu’s biggest victory so far in the Gaza war. However, the objective was not simply to eliminate any leadership figure, but to eliminate Hamas. So the question is: does Sinuar’s death mean the death of the organization?
Foreign Policy cites examples from the past to show that it is difficult for a terrorist organization that began as a movement against the occupying forces to die.
In 1948, Egyptian Prime Minister Mahmoud Fami Al Nukrasi banned the Muslim Brotherhood, believing that if the group were disbanded, stability would return to his country. In the three years preceding this measure, the Brotherhood took a leading role in inciting riots, strikes and violence, including the assassinations of a prime minister and a former finance minister.
However, the Brotherhood’s ban provoked even more violence. Freed from their leader – Hassan al-Banna – armed Muslim Brotherhood agents took matters into their own hands and launched a vengeful manhunt, culminating in the murder of Nukrasi. The government responded by arresting thousands of Muslim Brothers, and in February 1949, Bana was murdered. The Egyptian government never officially claimed responsibility for the assassination, but it is practically taken for granted that it ordered it. Almost 76 years later, the Egyptian government is still trying to crack down on the group.
That’s what we say “you can’t kill an idea”. But there is an even more subtle point in this story: it is difficult to escape the problem posed by a “resistance movement”. When leaders are killed, fanatical members often don’t get the message. On the contrary, they intensify their efforts.
Without a doubt, the assassination of Hamas leader Yahya Shinwar was a righteous act. He planned a terrible terrorist attack, which he himself hoped would be the start of a genocidal war to eliminate Israel. And in planning the devastating conflict that began with the October 7, 2023 attack, he knew that the Israelis would inflict unimaginable pain and bloodshed on the Palestinians of Gaza.
His death is a moment to reflect on the harm Sinuar caused to so many people, as well as the cause – the Palestinian state and justice – that he claimed to represent.
The number of leaders murdered
Does anyone remember Khalil al-Wazir? Abbas Al Moussawi? Fatih Shikaki? Ahmed Yasin? Wazir was Abu Jihad and together with Yasser Arafat led the armed wing of Fatah, whose forces were eventually absorbed by the PLO. Shikaki, a doctor by profession, headed the Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
Mousavi preceded Hassan Nasrallah as leader of Hezbollah. And Ahmed Yassin led Hamas after the creation of the Palestinian branch of the Muslim Brotherhood in the late 1980s.
They are all dead. They were killed in spectacular intelligence or military operations. Yet no matter how skilled the Israelis became at avenging blood in their decades-long fight against terrorism, they were never able to end the cycle of violence.
And the organizations that remained alive
It remains an armed wing of the PLO, which played a bloody role in the Second Intifada. After the Israelis killed Mousavi in 1992, Nasrallah transformed the group into the most heavily armed non-state entity in the world. In the weeks since the Israelis killed Nasrallah and eliminated most of Hezbollah’s leadership, its fighters have launched the deadliest rocket attacks on Israel.
In 1995, Shikaki was shot five times outside a hotel in Malta, but decades later, Islamic Jihad continued to target Israelis with suicide bombers and rockets from Gaza. Yassin – like Nasrallah – was killed in an air strike. His violent death never forced his successors to rethink their strategy. Why should Sinuar’s murder be any different?
One could argue that Sinwar’s death will finally break Hamas, which has been under heavy blows from the Israeli military for a year. They lost. There is a belief among some analysts and elected officials in the United States that only when Israel is completely defeated will peace be possible. With Sinuar’s murder, could that moment come?
This is the hope. This was made clear in the statement by US President Joe Biden. However, those who know the region well know that it is more likely that Hamas operatives will continue to fight, avenging their enemies. Resistance – as they perceive their actions – is a critical component of their identity. That’s why Sinuar wanted to die from a gunshot to the head and not from a stroke or old age. He believed his violent death would inspire even more “resistance.”