Iran has said the circumstances of Yahya Sinwar’s d3ath in an active warzone will strengthen the “spirit of resistance.”
The Israel Defense Forces k!lled Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar during a strike in Gaza on Thursday, October 17.
Sinwar led Hamas operations in Gaza since 2017, and he is believed to be the key architect of the October 7, 2023 attack in which Palestinian militants killed 1,200 people in Israel.
Sinwar was in a building in Rafah in the southern portion of the coastal enclave and was found coincidentally, one of the Israeli officials said. The building was the setting of a routine IDF operation Thursday, according to that same official and a third Israeli official familiar with the situation.
IDF soldiers engaged in a firefight with Hamas fighters near the building and Sinwar was found inside with several other Hamas commanders. It’s unclear whether Sinwar was living in the building or was passing through from another location inside Gaza.
“When Muslims look up to Martyr Sinwar standing on the battlefield – in combat attire and out in the open, not in a hideout, facing the enemy – the spirit of resistance will be strengthened,” Iran’s mission to the UN said in a statement on X.
“He will become a model for the youth and children who will carry forward his path toward the liberation of Palestine. As long as occupation and aggression exist, resistance will endure, for the martyr remains alive and a source of inspiration,” it said.
Along with Hezbollah, the Houthis and other groups, Hamas is part of an Iran-led alliance spanning Lebanon, Yemen, Syria, Gaza and Iraq that has attacked Israel and its allies since Israel’s war in Gaza began. They say they won’t stop striking Israel and its allies until a ceasefire is reached in the Palestinian enclave.