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IDF Spokesperson/TPS-IL on 14 May, 2025
Mohammed Sinwar’s Fate Unknown After Israeli Airstrike
Jerusalem, 14 May, 2025 (TPS-IL) -- The fate of Hamas’ military leader Muhammad Sinwar remained unclear on Wednesday morning after airstrike targeted what the Israel Defense Forces said was an underground Hamas command center beneath a Gaza hospital. While the IDF said Sinwar was the intended target, the military has not confirmed if he was killed.
Footage released by the military appeared to show the aftermath of the strike, with large plumes of smoke rising from around the hospital and nearby areas. “We will not allow the Hamas terrorist organization to use hospitals and humanitarian facilities in Gaza as shelters and terrorist headquarters,” said Defense Minister Israel Katz. “We will pursue them and their leaders and strike them everywhere.”
The IDF emphasized it had taken measures to avoid civilian casualties, including the use of precision-guided bombs and real-time aerial surveillance. “The Hamas terror organization continues to use hospitals in the Gaza Strip for terror purposes, cynically and cruelly exploiting the civilian population in and around the hospital,” the military said.
Several hours after the strike, additional explosions were reported near the hospital. Online footage showed parts of the ground collapsed in the vicinity of the blast, consistent with subterranean infrastructure.
Sinwar, a longtime Hamas operative, rose to the top of Hamas following the death of Muhammad Deif in a July airstrike and his older brother Yahya, who was killed during a chance encounter with soldiers in October.
Mohammed Sinwar is described as a staunch opponent of a negotiated end to the war and the release of hostages. He is also firmly in the terror group’s pro-Iran camp. In the 1990s, he was jailed by Israel for nine months and later imprisoned by the Palestinian Authority for three years before escaping in 2000. In 2006, Sinwar was involved in the abduction of IDF soldier Gilad Shalit and later commanded Hamas’s Khan Yunis Brigade.
In the hours following Tuesday’s strike, three rockets were launched from northern Gaza at Ashkelon and Sderot in southern Israel. Two were intercepted and one fell in an open area, according to the IDF. There were no injuries, and Palestinian Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility.
The military also issued an evacuation warning for residents of Jabalia in northern Gaza. IDF Arabic-language spokesman Col. Avichay Adraee posted a map online, calling it a “final warning” before further strikes.
On Tuesday, Israel struck part of the Nasser Hospital in Khan Yunis where Hamas operatives had set up a command and control center. Ismail Barhoum, a member of the Hamas politburo and the terror group’s financial chief, was killed in an airstrike in the same hospital in March.
Eighty-five percent of Gaza’s hospitals have been used by Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad for terror according to the Israel Defense Forces.
As reported by The Press Service of Israel in 2023, Hamas made extensive use of the Shifa Hospital, Gaza’s largest medical center. Hamas launched rockets from its compound, hid hostages in the bowels of the building, tortured collaborators, and dug tunnel shafts.
Other Palestinians told Israeli interrogators Hamas deeply embedded itself in the Palestinian Red Crescent Society to use hospitals and clinics as a base for attacks.
At least 1,180 people were killed, and 252 Israelis and foreigners were taken hostage in Hamas’s attacks on Israeli communities near the Gaza border on October 7. Of the 58 remaining hostages, 36 are believed to be dead.
