Israel announced Friday that it had attacked Hamas military wing chief Izz al-Din al-Haddad. According to Palestinian reports, an apartment in the Rimal neighborhood of Gaza City was hit from the air. An Israeli security official said there are initial indications that Haddad had been eliminated.
Haddad was considered Hamas' most senior military commander and the last senior official remaining in the Gaza Strip from among the leaders of the Oct. 7 massacre.
Israeli officials said that shortly after intelligence about Haddad's location was received by IDF Southern Command and Military Intelligence Directorate, Israeli Air Force jets took off to carry out the strike. According to security officials, the strike was made possible by years of prolonged intelligence surveillance and significant information gathering by the IDF.
It was further stated that throughout the war, he moved between numerous hiding places, was significantly involved in the hostages portfolio in the Gaza Strip, and even surrounded himself with hostages, including the Nahal Oz surveillance soldiers, in an attempt to prevent IDF strikes. Israel says that under his command, Hamas "murdered, starved and abused hostages," as part of an attempt to ensure his personal safety and the terrorist organization's survival.
At the beginning of the war, he was the commander of the Gaza City Brigade. He is also considered to have been among those privy to the date of the Oct. 7, 2023, terrorist attack. After the elimination of Ahmed Ghandour, commander of the northern Gaza Strip brigade, the entire area came under al-Haddad's responsibility. Following the eliminations of the heads of the "military wing," Mohammed Deif, Marwan Issa and Mohammed Sinwar, al-Haddad became head of the wing.
According to reports, al-Haddad survived a total of six elimination attempts, three of them during the latest war. As part of this, it was reported that an Israeli force had been sent to eliminate him at the house where he was hiding, but he was not found there.
At the beginning of the war, a $750,000 bounty was placed on al-Haddad's head. The Times claimed that, according to intelligence, al-Haddad constantly changed locations and relied on very few people outside his inner circle. According to Palestinian sources, two of his sons, who operated as terrorists, were eliminated during the war.
In an interview with Arab media in January, al-Haddad answered a question about whether Iran and Hezbollah had known about the terrorist attack in advance. "Given the large scale and the expected consequences of the attack, the brothers in the axis of resistance were updated on the situation," he said. "But we kept the timing of the zero hour within the narrowest possible circle to ensure the attack's success."
According to a report in The Wall Street Journal, a released Israeli hostage met al-Haddad five times in captivity, at times sleeping with him in the same hideout apartment.
