\n<\/p>\n
The Israeli military has confirmed that Marwan Issa, the deputy commander of Hamas\u2019s military wing in Gaza and a presumed mastermind of the Oct. 7 assault on southern Israel, was killed in an Israeli airstrike earlier this month.<\/p>\n
A senior U.S. official, Jake Sullivan, had previously told reporters that Mr. Issa, one of the highest-ranking officials in Hamas, had been killed. But before Tuesday\u2019s statement<\/a>, Israel\u2019s military had said only that its warplanes had targeted Mr. Issa and another senior Hamas official in an underground compound in central Gaza.<\/p>\n With his death, Mr. Issa, who had been among Israel\u2019s most wanted men, became the senior-most Hamas leader to be killed in Gaza since the start of the war. Israeli officials have characterized the strike as a breakthrough in their campaign to wipe out the Hamas leadership in Gaza.<\/p>\n But experts cautioned that his death \u2014 which Hamas has still not acknowledged \u2014 would not have a devastating effect on the armed group\u2019s leadership structure. Israel has killed Hamas\u2019s political and military leaders in the past, only to see them quickly replaced.<\/p>\n Here is a closer look at Mr. Issa and what his death means for Hamas and its leadership.<\/p>\n Mr. Issa, who was 58 or 59 at the time of his death, had served since 2012 as a deputy to Mohammed Deif, the elusive leader of the Qassam Brigades, Hamas\u2019s military wing. Mr. Issa assumed the role after the assassination of another top commander, Ahmed al-Jabari.<\/p>\n Mr. Issa served both on Hamas\u2019s military council and in its Gaza political office, overseen by Yahya Sinwar, the group\u2019s highest-ranking official in the enclave. Mr. Issa was described by Palestinian analysts and former Israeli security officials as an important strategist who played a key role as a liaison between Hamas\u2019s military and political leaders.<\/p>\n Salah al-Din al-Awawdeh, a Palestinian analyst close to Hamas, described Mr. Issa\u2019s position in the group as \u201cpart of the front rank of the military wing\u2019s leadership.\u201d<\/p>\n Maj. Gen. Tamir Hayman, the former Israeli military intelligence chief, said Mr. Issa was simultaneously Hamas\u2019s \u201cdefense minister,\u201d its deputy military commander and its \u201cstrategic mind.\u201d<\/p>\n Experts described Mr. Issa as an important associate of Mr. Deif and Mr. Sinwar, though they said his death did not represent a threat to the group\u2019s survival.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s always a replacement,\u201d Mr. Awawdeh said. \u201cI don\u2019t think the assassination of any member of the military wing will have an effect on its activities.\u201d<\/p>\n Michael Milshtein, a former Israeli military intelligence officer and an expert on Palestinian affairs, said Mr. Issa\u2019s death was a significant blow to the Qassam Brigades, though he conceded it wasn\u2019t \u201cthe end of the world\u201d for Hamas.<\/p>\n \u201cHe had a lot of experience,\u201d Mr. Milshtein said. \u201cHis death is a big loss for Hamas, but it isn\u2019t a loss that will lead to its collapse and it won\u2019t affect it for a long time. In a week or two, they\u2019ll overcome it.\u201d<\/p>\n Mr. Milshtein added that even though Mr. Issa\u2019s opinion was valued at the highest levels of Hamas, the fact he did not directly command fighters meant his death did not leave a gaping hole in Hamas\u2019s operations.<\/p>\n Mr. Issa was a lesser-known member of Hamas\u2019s top brass, maintaining a low profile and rarely appearing in public.<\/p>\n Gerhard Conrad, a former German intelligence officer who met Mr. Issa more than a decade ago, described him as a \u201cdecisive and quiet\u201d person lacking charisma. \u201cHe was not very eloquent, but he knew what to say, and he was straight to the point,\u201d Mr. Conrad said in an interview.<\/p>\n Mr. Conrad said he met Mr. Issa, Mr. al-Jabari and Mahmoud al-Zahar, another senior Hamas official, about ten times between 2009 and 2011 in Gaza City. The men met as part of an effort to broker a prisoner swap between Israel and Hamas.<\/p>\n \u201cHe was the master of the data on the prisoners,\u201d Mr. Conrad said of Mr. Issa. \u201cHe had all the names to be negotiated on.\u201d<\/p>\n Mr. Conrad, however, said it was apparent at the time that Mr. Issa was a subordinate to Mr. al-Jabari. \u201cHe was a kind of chief of staff,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n It was only after Mr. al-Jabari\u2019s assassination that Mr. Issa\u2019s prominence grew, but he still was keen to stay out of view. Few images of Mr. Issa are in the public domain.<\/p>\n Mr. Awawdeh, the analyst, called Mr. Issa a man who liked to \u201cremain in the shadows\u201d and who seldom granted interviews to the media.<\/p>\n In one of those rare interviews<\/a>, Mr. Issa spoke in 2021 about his role in the indirect talks that resulted in Israel exchanging more than 1,000 Palestinian prisoners<\/a> for a single Israeli soldier, Sgt. First Class Gilad Shalit, and his hopes for a future conflict with Israel.<\/p>\n \u201cEven if the resistance in Palestine is monitored by the enemy at all hours, it will surprise the enemy,\u201d he told Al Jazeera at the time.<\/p>\n In a separate interview with a Hamas publication in 2005, Mr. Issa lauded militants who raided Israeli settlements and military bases, calling the actions \u201cheroic\u201d and an \u201cadvanced activity.\u201d<\/p>\n Mr. Issa was born in the Bureij area of central Gaza in 1965, but his family hails from what is now the Ashkelon area in Israel.<\/p>\n A Hamas member for decades, he was involved with the militant group involved pursuing Palestinians who were believed to have collaborated with Israel, according to Mr. Awawdeh.<\/p>\n Mr. Issa spent time in prisons operated by both Israel and the Palestinian Authority.<\/p>\n Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, a spokesman for the Israeli military, has said that Mr. Issa helped plan the Hamas-led Oct. 7 attack. Mr. Issa is also thought to have planned operations aimed at infiltrating Israeli settlements during the second intifada in the 2000s, Mr. Milshtein said.<\/p>\n March 18, 2024<\/p>\n :\u00a0<\/p>\n An earlier version of this article misstated the surname of a former Israeli military intelligence chief. He is Tamir Hayman, not Heyman.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n How we handle corrections<\/p>\n<\/div>\nWhat was Mr. Issa\u2019s role in Hamas?<\/h2>\n
What does his death mean for the group?<\/h2>\n
How has he been described?<\/h2>\n
What is known about his early life?<\/h2>\n