What will happen in Gaza after Sinwar's killing?

Israel killed Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar.It could be a prelude to a ceasefire in Gaza, but Netanyahu doesn't want to stop.

• Yahya Sinwar had taken the reins of Hamas after the killing of Ismail Haniyeh last July.
• Sinwar's success could be his brother Mohammed, but also figures living in Qatar.
• Israel's plan is to move forward to create a new order in the Middle East, which however will lead to new radicalisms.

On October 17, Israel announced that it had killed Yahya Sinwar, the leader of the Palestinian organization Hamas.Sinwar was considered the mastermind of the attacks October 7, 2023 on Israeli soil and after the killing of Ismail Haniyeh in July, who was the political leader of Hamas, he had assumed this position, alongside that of military leader of the organization in the Gaza Strip.

Israel has always put the killing of Sinwar at the top of its objectives, at least declared, of the offensive on Gaza.His death follows that of most of the leadership of Hamas, but it should not be the prelude to a ceasefire.Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the operations would continue.

Who will succeed Sinwar?

Yahya Sinwar was killed quite random.If the political leader of Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh, he had been killed even while he was in Iran, if the leader of Hezbollah, Hassan Nasrallah, he fell Under a hail of Israeli bombs that leveled an entire block in Beirut, Sinwar, who was Israel's number one target, was killed by some soldiers who had spotted three suspicious figures in a building in Rafah.Once they opened fire, they found themselves in front of the body of Sinwar, considered the mastermind of the October 7 attacks on Israeli soil, which caused around 1,200 deaths and 251 people taken hostage.Israel had been saying for months that the Hamas leader was hiding in the tunnels with several hostages to shield him, a version that was contradicted by the manner of his killing.

The death of Sinwar, announced on October 17, that of Haniyeh last July and the killing of numerous other Hamas leaders over the last year, as Marwan Issa And Mohammed Deif, have effectively crippled the leadership of the Palestinian organization.When Israel launched the military offensive in the Gaza Strip, it turned into a genocide with over 42 thousand deaths, he did so by saying he wanted to eliminate Hamas.Today the organization still exists, because there are thousands of members, but its reference figures, those who led them, are no longer there.

Today the organization could pass into the hands of his brother, Mohammed Sinwar.The names that he advanced The New York Times they are others, like those of Khaled Meshal, who had already been at the political leadership of Hamas until 2017; Khalil al-Hayya, who was the late Sinwar's own deputy;And Mousa Abu Marzouk, among the founders of Hamas.They are all people who live abroad, in particular in Qatar, where the Hamas political office of the Palestinian diaspora is located.The new leader of Hamas may in fact be a living figure outside the Gaza Strip, therefore less radical and more “institutional”.As was Haniyeh, who lived right in Qatar and who was among the most moderate.But he was killed by Israel anyway.

What happens now in Gaza?

While we wait to understand what will become of the management of Hamas now that his leadership has effectively been completely eliminated, new scenarios are also opening up for Israel.

The killing of Sinwar, Haniyeh and most of the Hamas leadership is very harsh political coup for the organization and, as they would like The United States, could be the prelude to a ceasefire in Gaza.That's what the Forum of families of Israeli hostages, who have long been putting pressure on Netanyahu to reach an agreement with Hamas and who now more than ever no longer see the reasons to go ahead with an offensive that seems to have achieved its objectives.Yet the Israeli prime minister does not seem willing to stop

"This it's not the end of the war in Gaza,” Netanyahu announced.Over 42 thousand deaths, a territory effectively razed to the ground, seemed to be the Israeli justification for crippling the movement Hamas.But the plans are evidently broader.The parallel bombings on Lebanon and the killing of Hassan Nasrallah they are in fact proof of this:Israel no longer wants to limit itself to reducing Hamas in Palestine, it wants to erase its presence and that of its allies, establishing a new order in Middle East.It is no coincidence that the next objective could be theIran, with the desire to reduce its power and influence in the region.However, the more Israel raises its sights, the more it will plant the seeds of resistance and radicalism.

As he underlined the Israeli analyst Daniel Levy to Al Jazeera, “there is an Israeli-Western obsession that if you remove the leader, you cut off the head of the serpent, as if Palestinian resistance was based on the mesmerizing attractiveness of Mr. Sinwar or any other leader assassinated in the past.Resistance, however, is a function of oppressive conditions and of denial of rights where people are kept."In an infinite spiral, Israel with its violence is creating the conditions for new forms of radicalization which will jeopardize its very existence.