Israel Kills Four Senior Hamas Leaders

The IDF, having endured a series of rejections by Hamas of extending the first phase of the hostages-for-criminals deal, finally had had enough, and on March 17, waves of IAF planes attacked Hamas targets in Gaza. Hamas claims that 404 people were killed, including “dozens of children,” and 600 were wounded. There is no reason to believe those figures, because Hamas has a long record of exaggerating the number of those killed. In addition, it does not distinguish between combatants and civilians, but does supply the media with unproven claims that “most of the casualties are women and children.” These claims are uncritically repeated by that media. The IDF does not know exactly how many casualties there have been, and how many of those are civilians, and of those how many are women and children, and it will be weeks before it will come up with what it believes are more accurate estimates. The IDF is always at a disadvantage in the information wars with the practiced dissemblers of Hamas. As Mark Twain said, “A lie can travel halfway round the world, while the truth is putting on its shoes.”

Among those killed, however, as announced by Hamas and confirmed by the IDF, were four of the six highest-ranking Hamas leaders. More on those high-value targets that have now been successfully eliminated as they were plotting, according to Israel, another surprise assault on the Jewish state can be found here: “IAF strikes in Gaza Strip kill four senior Hamas officials,” by Yonah Jeremy Bob, Jerusalem Post, March 18, 2025:

The IDF confirmed Tuesday evening that it has killed four out of six senior Hamas officials who the terror group itself have announced as being hit by IDF strikes.

It is possible that all six are dead, but Hamas sometimes spreads misinformation for a variety of strategic reasons, so the IDF does not confirm deaths of its senior officials until it obtains its own independent evidence (and even then there have been a few cases where the IDF wrongly announced having killed a Hamas official.)

The four were: Issam al-Da’alis, who has served as Hamas’s political Gazan prime minister, Mahmoud Abu Watfa, the director-general of Hamas’s Interior Ministry and related terror forces, Bahjat Abu Sultan, operational chief of Hamas’s internal security apparatus, and Hamas justice minister Ahmed Omar al-Hatta.

Hamas also said that senior officials Muhammad al-Jamasi and Yasir Herev were killed in IDF strikes, though the military has not yet confirmed those deaths.

Hamas has said that six of the most senior Hamas officials were killed. The IDF, ever cautious, is waiting for more information on Al-Jamasi and Herev before it will confirm their deaths.

Al-Da’alis was the most senior of the officials, but the most critical officials for Hamas at this stage are its military chief Muhammad Sinwar, brother of Yahya Sinwar, and one of the few remaining central planners of the October 7 invasion, and Khalil al-Haya, who was Yahya Sinwar’s political deputy and has been the lead Hamas negotiator on the hostages issue….

Israel has said it will continue to strike at Hamas until it agrees to an extension of the first part of the lopsided hostages-for-criminals deal. The IDF has announced that this is “not a one-day strike.” How long, do you think, do Yahya Sinwar and Khalil al-Haya have to live?

Hamas eulogized the “martyrs” saying: “As we mourn these leaders who have worked since the beginning of the war of extermination to alleviate the suffering of their people, faithfully shouldering the responsibility entrusted to them, and who have ascended after a journey filled with sacrifices and honorable stances—serving as exemplars of dedication and devotion to their work—we affirm that the loss of government leadership will not deter us from fulfilling our national duty toward our Palestinian people. We remain committed to our religious obligation and our ethical and professional role in serving them, supporting their resilience, and standing firm in the face of this brutal aggression.”

The only “war of extermination” in the region is that which had its opening salvo when 6,000 Hamas operatives smashed into Israel on October 7,2023 and proceeded to rape, torture, mutilate, and murder 1,200 Israelis — men, women, children, and babies. This was the opening salvo in what was to have been a war of extermination. Hamas would gladly have extended that war in time and space, until every last Jew in Israel was either killed or expelled. Unfortunately for Hamas, the people of Israel girded their loins, 360,000 Reservists showed up as one man to fight, and the war which lasted 16 months in its first phase — with Israel moving heaven and earth to warn civilians in Gaza away from sites about to be targeted — is now, it seems, after a two-month ceasefire, on again. This time the Israelis mean to completely crush Hamas.

Diplomatically, the American government, under new management, now has Israel’s back, and the Israelis are keenly aware of the Trump administration’s steadfast support. It was Donald Trump who, instead of following Biden and withholding weapons to force changes in the IDF’s operations, told Prime Minister Netanyahu to “do whatever you want” in Gaza. And the Israelis have kept Washington informed, in advance, of the latest bombing campaign in Gaza, with not the slightest objection being raised by the Americans. In fact, the American military are apparently coordinating their attacks on the Houthis with the IDF’s attacks in Gaza, keeping the Houthis on the defensive, unable to effectively respond to Israel, while waiting nervously for the next airstrikes on western Yemen by the Americans. Can you imagine that sort of military coordination with Israel happening under the Biden-Blinken dispensation? No, I can’t, either.

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