A top Hamas official vowed on Friday that the killing of the group’s leader, Yahya Sinwar, would change nothing for its war with Israel, saying that it would fight on even as President Biden pressed for a deal to stop the conflict in the Gaza Strip and free the remaining hostages there.
In Hamas’s first official comments since Israel announced Mr. Sinwar’s death on Thursday, his deputy, Khalil al-Hayya, said that the group maintained its conditions for a cease-fire. He said Hamas still insisted on an end to Israel’s onslaught in Gaza, as well as its complete withdrawal from the territory and the release of Palestinian prisoners in Israel.
“We are continuing Hamas’s path,” Mr. al-Hayya, who lives in exile in Qatar, said in televised remarks in which he praised Mr. Sinwar for dying on the battlefield and added that his “banner will not fall.” It remained unclear when Hamas would announce a successor to Mr. Sinwar, who was fatally shot by Israeli soldiers in southern Gaza on Wednesday.
Mr. Sinwar orchestrated the Hamas assault on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023, during which about 1,200 people were killed and another 250 were taken to Gaza as hostages. The assault led to Israel’s ongoing military campaign in Gaza, which has killed 42,000 people, according to local health officials, and left much of the territory in ruins.
Mr. Biden and top members of his administration have expressed hope that Mr. Sinwar’s death could provide an opening toward ending the war, which has spread to include allies of Hamas like the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah, which began firing rockets into Israel last October, and Iran, which backs both militant groups.
American officials, as well as many Israelis, have been pushing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel to reach a cease-fire deal that would secure the release of the 101 hostages still being held in Gaza, at least a third of whom are believed to be dead.
Speaking to reporters in Berlin on Friday, Mr. Biden said the killing of Mr. Sinwar was “a moment of justice” and “an opportunity to seek a path to peace — a better future in Gaza without Hamas.”
The United States had often blamed Mr. Sinwar for obstructing a cease-fire deal. John F. Kirby, the national security spokesman for the White House, reiterated that on Friday.
“Each and every time, Sinwar found a way to stop it,” Mr. Kirby said, adding that “his death does provide a unique opportunity here.”
But Mr. Netanyahu on Thursday took an ambiguous stance toward the entreaties of his American allies abroad, who want a deal, and his far-right allies at home, who want to crush Hamas. The prime minister’s office released a statement saying that he agreed with Mr. Biden that there was “an opportunity to advance a deal to free the hostages,” but Mr. Netanyahu also said in a video address that Israel would continue its attacks on Hamas.
“This is not the end of the war in Gaza,” he said in the address. “It is the beginning of the end.”
Iranian officials, as the Hamas deputy did, struck a defiant tone and described Mr. Sinwar in heroic terms, with Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi saying that the Palestinian cause “is more alive than ever.”
In Gaza, where Palestinians have borne the brunt of Israel’s bombardment and ground invasion, many expressed hope that Mr. Sinwar’s death could lead to an agreement to stop the violence.
“The first moment I heard his death, I felt relieved that finally we will have a truce or cease-fire on the ground,” said Shorouq Abu Hammad, 22, as she was shopping in Khan Younis, where Mr. Sinwar was born. Many of her neighbors felt the same way, she said, about a leader who “caused all this tragedy for the Gazan people.”
Ms. Abu Hammad said she had lost a brother in the war and that another brother had his legs amputated because of injuries suffered in Israeli attacks. She said she, too, had been injured.
“Sinwar is the one who planned all of this,” she said, “and now it is a normal outcome that he be killed.”
Others were less optimistic that Mr. Sinwar’s death would change the trajectory of Hamas or the war. “He is gone now, and we will see what he has left behind,” said Ahmed Awad, 21, who was forced to stop his university studies in design.
In Israel, many celebrated Mr. Sinwar’s demise as just retribution for the man who plotted the deadliest assault on the country in its history. But relatives of the hostages also voiced concern that their family members might now be in greater danger.
“I heard a lot of celebrations and cheers of joy in my neighborhood, and justifiably so,” said Anna Astmaker, a cousin of Karina Ariev, an Israeli soldier who was abducted from an army base near the Gaza border and who turned 20 in captivity.
“But my head immediately filled with questions,” she said. “What does it mean for Karina and the other hostages?”
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