Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar was killed by a single gunshot to his head, his autopsy has found.
The architect of the October 7 massacre and Israel’s most wanted man, he was killed on Wednesday after being hunted by intelligence services and the Israeli Defence Forces for over a year.
The 61-year-old – dubbed the Butcher of Khan Younis – was finally taken out apparently by chance after an hour-long firefight of trainee soldiers on a routine operation in the Rafah area of the Gaza Strip.
The strike has seen a shock wave spread across the region – with Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei declaring: ‘Hamas is alive and will remain alive.’
During the fierce battle, two militants fled to one building while Sinwar – whose identity was not known by the Israelis until much later – escaped to another.
In a graphic display of the intensity of the encounter, the Hamas leader was found with electric cable tied in a makeshift tourniquet around his arm, which was wounded by shrapnel from a small missile or tank shell.
But Dr. Chen Kugel, who oversaw his autopsy, told The New York Times: ‘It wouldn’t have worked in any case. It wasn’t strong enough and his forearm was smashed.’
The terrorist chief was later shot in the head, the director of Israel’s national forensic institute revealed.
It is not known who fired the bullet or what kind of weapon was used to deliver the fatal blow.
After the dust had cleared, Israeli soldiers realised the body found in the rubble of the now-blown apart building bore a striking resemlance to Sinwar.
They cut off one of his fingers to confirm his identity.
According to the Israeli military, Sinwar had been forced out of the underground lair where he was cowering ás they covertly closed off streets and blew up tunnels in the area.
Dr Kugel said he was pale, explained by the amount of time he spent in Hamas’ subterranean network, and weighed over 150 pounds – showing no signs of malnutrition.
Continuing, the Israeli medic said: ‘It was only when I stepped outside that I internalized that this was the man responsible for more murder than anyone in the history of the country.’
The body is now held by the country’s military – alongside hundreds of corpses of dead Palestinians, to be used for a future trade with Hamas.
Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei today responded to the death of Sinwar, saying it will not halt the ‘Axis of Resistance’ and that Hamas would live on.
‘His loss is undoubtedly painful for the Axis of Resistance, but this front did not cease advancing with the martyrdom of prominent figures,’ Khamenei said in a statement. ‘Hamas is alive and will remain alive.’
‘He was a shining face of resistance and struggle. With a steely resolve, he stood against the oppressive and aggressive enemy. With wisdom and courage, he dealt them the irreparable blow of October 7 that has been recorded in the history of this region. Then, with honor and pride, he ascended to the heavens of the martyrs.’
The ‘Axis of Resistance’, built up with years of Iranian support, includes Hamas, the Lebanese Hezbollah group, the Houthi movement in Yemen, and various Shi’ite groups in Iraq and Syria.
The groups describe themselves as the resistance to Israel and U.S. influence in the Middle East.
‘As always, we will remain by the side of the sincere fighters and combatants, by God’s grace and help,’ Khamenei continued.
Last night the Prime Minister called on the international community to ‘make to most of this moment’ to push for peace after Hamas’ leader was killed in a gunfight.
Sir Keir Starmer, after joining US, French and German leaders on Friday, said the killing of Yahya Sinwar offered an ‘opportunity’ to step up ceasefire talks that have so far failed to produce a breakthrough.
Speaking at a press conference after discussions as part of the so-called ‘Quad’ of nations, Sir Keir said the ‘answer is diplomacy’ in resolving the long-running war in Gaza and violence in the wider region.
He said: ‘No one should mourn the death of Hamas leader Sinwar.
‘On his hands is the blood of innocent Israelis killed on October 7 and over the years of terror, and also the blood of Palestinian people who suffered in the chaos and violence that he sought and celebrated.
‘Allies will keep working together to de-escalate across the region because we know there is no military-only solution.
‘The answer is diplomacy and now we must make the most of this moment.
‘What is needed now is a ceasefire, immediate and unconditional release of all hostages, immediate access to humanitarian aid and a return to the path towards the two-state solution, as the only way to deliver long-term peace and security.’
A unit from the IDF’s 828th Bislamach Brigade was patrolling Tal al-Sultan, an area of Rafah, on Wednesday morning, when it came across a group of three Hamas fighters in the street and engaged them in a firefight.
The terrorists were ‘on the run’ moving from house to house, the IDF said, and became split up.
One of them, since identified as Sinwar, ‘ran alone into one of the buildings’. He went up to the second floor, and troops responded by firing a tank shell in his direction.
The unit, made up of trainee infantry commanders and reservists, then began to sweep the area, according to Israeli media.
Two grenades were thrown at them, one of which exploded while the other failed to go off, Ynet reports.
The troops decided it was too dangerous to proceed and pulled back, sending in a mini drone to trace the fleeing fighter instead.
Dramatic footage released by the IDF shows the bloodied Sinwar, his face concealed by a scarf, throwing a stick in a final attempt to defend himself against the drone just seconds before he was assassinated.
Two 120mm tank shells slammed into the building, as well as a surface-to-surface Matador missile, according to Israeli reports, with shrapnel scything across the upper floors.
Unaware they had taken out Israel’s prime target, the soldiers did not return to the site until Thursday morning, when soldiers from the 450th Infantry Battalion were sent in to get a closer look.
As they inspected the dead, they realised one bore a striking resemblance to the Hamas leader.
Graphic images emerged of his corpse lying on the rubble surrounded by Israeli soldiers, while close ups showed a catastrophic head wound and multiple injuries.
He was found with a weapon, a flak jacket and 40,000 shekels (£8,250).
‘Yahya Sinouar had a lot of cash and fake passports on him, he was ready to flee,’ Israeli army spokesman Colonel Olivier Rafowicz told French outlet CNEWS this morning.
He claimed that the items Sinwar had on him, which allegedly also included a card from UNRWA, the UN aid for Palestinian refugees, ‘may show that he was ready to flee and leave Gaza and his men behind.’
Booby traps around the area meant the corpse had to be left in place, but part of one of his fingers was removed and sent for testing.
Confirmation of his death took several hours, with multiple tests carried out, and his identity eventually confirmed with dental records and fingerprints.
Four hours after it confirmed it was investigating whether the Hamas leader had been killed, the military issued a simple message on social media: ‘Eliminated: Yahya Sinwar.’
Pictures show Israeli troops carrying a body, believed to be Sinwar’s, out of the destroyed building on a stretcher.
Hamas has not made any comment itself, but sources within the group have said that the indications they have seen suggest Sinwar was indeed killed by Israeli troops.
‘The dozens of operations carried out by the IDF and the ISA over the last year, and in recent weeks in the area where he was eliminated, restricted Yahya Sinwar’s operational movement as he was pursued by the forces and led to his elimination,’ the Israeli military said in a statement.
Sinwar has been a prime target for Israeli forces since October 7, but Israel has allegedly been hesitant to make an assassination attempt amid reports that he was surrounded by Israeli hostages and was carrying a bag packed with explosives.
It is believed that Sinwar has 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.
The country had earlier 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, meaning they had his genetic information on file.
IDF spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari, confirmed the Hamas leader’s death in a televised statement last night.
‘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’.
Sinwar was born in Gaza’s Khan Younis refugee camp in 1962 and joined Hamas soon after its founding in the 1980s.
He dedicated himself to its radical Islamist ideology, which seeks to establish an Islamic state in historic Palestine and opposes Israel’s existence.
He became the protégé of Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, Hamas’s founder, as a young man, and was first arrested by Israel in 1982 while he was a student at the Islamic University in Gaza.
In prison, he gained a fearsome reputation as a ruthless enforcer, murdering suspected Israeli collaborators, and earned the nickname the Butcher of Khan Younis.
He learned Hebrew during his brutal 22-year sentence, which he was given for masterminding the abduction and murder of two Israeli soldiers and four Palestinians.
He emerged from prison as a street hero in Gaza, and quickly rose to the top of the Hamas ranks.
Hamas has not confirmed its leader’s death. It will have dealt a seismic blow to the organisation, which was already weakened by the assassination of its top military commander in July.
Experts say it the group may bid its time before acknowledging his death, while his body remains with the Israeli military.
His killing so soon after the death of his predecessor, Ismail Haniyeh, in July now begs the question of who might succeed him.