A picture taken from Rafah shows smoke billowing over Khan Yunis in the southern Gaza Strip during Israeli bombardment on March 4, 2024, amid ongoing battles between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas.
Said Khatib | Afp | Getty Images
Israel’s military on Thursday said it killed the chief of Hamas’ military wing, Mohammed Deif, in an airstrike in July.
“We can now confirm: Mohammed Deif was eliminated,” the Israel Defense Forces posted on its official X account.
The military said it spent weeks trying to confirm whether Deif, the target of the strike in the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, was killed in the blast, while Hamas denied his death. Hamas did not immediately comment on Thursday’s IDF announcement when contacted by CNBC.
Israel says that Deif and Yahya Sinwar, Hamas’ top leader in the Gaza Strip, were the chief planners of the Oct. 7 attack on Israel that killed some 1,200 people and took a further 253 hostage. Around116 of these captives have since been freed.
The October attack set off the ongoing Israel-Hamas war, now in its tenth month, and the Israeli military offensive in the Gaza enclave that local authorities say has killed more than 39,000 people.
The IDF announcement comes just one day after the killing of Hamas’ political leader, Ismail Haniyeh, in a strike on Tehran. Hamas and Iran say this was carried out by Israel, while the Jewish state has declined to comment on Haniyeh’s death.
The Israeli military said that the strike that killed Deif took place on July 13 and hit a compound on the outskirts of Khan Younis, near a tent encampment for displaced Palestinian people. More than 90 other people were killed in the strike, many of whom were living in the tents, the Gaza health authorities said at the time.
Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant called Deif the “Osama Bin Laden of Gaza” in a post on the X social media platform on Thursday, saying his death marked “a significant milestone in the process of dismantling Hamas as a military and governing authority in Gaza, and in the achievement of the goals of this war.”
Gallant added: “Israel’s defense establishment will pursue Hamas terrorists — both the planners and the perpetrators of the 07.10 massacre. We will not rest until this mission is accomplished.”