Israel has vowed to eliminate Hamas’ new leader, Yahya Sinwar, as the war in the Gaza Strip with the Palestinian movement entered its 11th month on Wednesday and threatens to spread across the Middle East.
Yahya Sinouar was appointed leader of the Islamist movement on Tuesday evening to replace Ismail Haniyeh, whose assassination on July 31 in Tehran was attributed to Israel by Iran, which has promised reprisals.
Israel accuses the radical activist, who until then was the leader of Hamas in the Gaza Strip, of being one of the masterminds of the unprecedented attack carried out on October 7 by the Palestinian Islamist movement on Israeli soil, which triggered the war.
Hunted by Israel, Yahya Sinouar, whose movement is considered a terrorist organization by the United States, the European Union and Israel, has not appeared in public since October 7.
“We will increase our efforts to find him, to attack him,” Israeli army chief Herzi Halevi said on Wednesday.
While all attempts at mediation have failed, the war, which has left nearly 40,000 dead, according to Hamas, in the small besieged Palestinian territory, has rekindled tensions in the Middle East, between Iran and its allies, including Lebanese Hezbollah, on the one hand, and Israel on the other.
These tensions have redoubled following the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh and that of Fouad Chokr, the military leader of Hezbollah who died on July 30 in an Israeli strike near Beirut.
Fouad Shokr is accused by Israel of being responsible for an attack that killed 12 children and teenagers on July 27 in Syria’s annexed Golan Heights. Hezbollah had denied any involvement.
“Forced to fight back”
Hezbollah and Iran are “obliged to respond” to these two assassinations, the leader of the Lebanese armed movement, Hassan Nasrallah, said on Tuesday. Hezbollah will respond “alone or as part of a unified response” from Iran and its allies, and “whatever the consequences,” he warned.
On Wednesday, at a meeting of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, its current president, Mamadou Tangara of Gambia, denounced the “ignoble” assassination of Haniyeh which risks plunging the Middle East into a “wider conflict.”
Faced with the risks of an extension of the war, the international community is engaged in a race against time to find ways of appeasement and to relaunch negotiations with a view to a ceasefire associated with the release of the hostages held in Gaza.
Diplomatic contacts are increasing, particularly between the mediating countries, the United States, Qatar and Egypt.
“Mr. Sinouar was and remains the primary decision-maker regarding the conclusion of a ceasefire,” stressed the head of American diplomacy, Antony Blinken, on Tuesday.
The secretary of state, whose country is Israel’s main ally, called on Iran and Israel to avoid a military “escalation.”
French President Emmanuel Macron also urged Tehran to “move away from the logic of retaliation” and to “do everything” to avoid a new escalation.
Iranian President Massoud Pezeshkian has called on Western countries to stop supporting Israel to “avoid” a regional war.
” A fighter “
In the Gaza Strip, residents interviewed by AFP said they were pessimistic after the appointment of Yahya Sinouar, who would live in the Palestinian territory unlike Ismail Haniyeh who was based in Qatar, a key interlocutor of Hamas.
“He is a fighter, how can negotiations take place?” asked a Palestinian, Mohammed al-Sharif. Another Gazan, Hani al-Qano, however, hoped “that this will speed up the end of the war, because Sinwar lives in the Gaza Strip among the besieged population.”
After ten months of war, the Israeli army is continuing its land and air offensive against Hamas, in power since 2007 in Gaza, particularly in areas which it had claimed to have taken control of but where fighting has resumed.
The army announced on Wednesday that it was continuing its operations in the centre of the territory and had “eliminated numerous terrorists”.
The attack carried out on October 7 by Hamas commandos in southern Israel resulted in the deaths of 1,198 people, mostly civilians, according to an AFP count based on official Israeli data.
Of the 251 people abducted, 111 are still being held in Gaza, 39 of whom are dead, according to the army.
In retaliation, Israel launched an offensive that has so far killed 39,677 people, including at least 24 in 24 hours, according to data from the Hamas-run Gaza government’s health ministry, which does not provide details on the number of civilians and fighters killed.
Israel has been on alert for nearly a week, awaiting the response promised by Iran and its allies.
“I know that the citizens of Israel are on alert and I ask one thing of you: to maintain your patience and your composure,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday during a visit to the Tel Hashomer military base near Tel Aviv.
Fears of a conflagration are also very high in Lebanon, where Israeli military planes once again broke the sound barrier over Beirut on Wednesday.
Since the start of the war in Gaza, Hezbollah, which is very powerful in Lebanon, has exchanged fire almost daily with the Israeli army along the border separating southern Lebanon from northern Israel.
In this context, several countries have called on their nationals to leave the country and airlines have suspended their connections with the Lebanese capital.