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Lebanon names new Hamas leader after Yahya Sinwar's assassination
Khaled Meshal will take over as head of the group's political arm, replacing the slain Yahya Sinwar. Meshal served as head of Hamas's political bureau from 1996 to 2017 before ceding the leadership to Ismail Haniyeh, who was killed in the summer.
According to a Lebanese television channel, Palestinian leaders told Turkish, Qatari and Egyptian mediators that their leader Yahya Sinwar was killed in the Tal al-Sultan area of Rafah and that Mesha al would become the head of the political faction.
The channel also reported that during a phone call between US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Qatari Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed bin Abdul Rahman Al Thani, the killings of Sinwar and their impact on the ceasefire talks in Gaza were discussed.
Meshaal served as head of Hamas' political bureau from 1996 to 2017, before ceding leadership to Ismail Haniyeh. He currently lives in Qatar. Previously, he lived in Syria, Jordan, and Kuwait. In 1998, Israeli intelligence in Jordan injected him with poison, leaving him in a coma. The antidote was provided by Israel as part of a diplomatic agreement with Jordan.
Haniyeh was killed in an Israeli airstrike on his Tehran compound in July this year. Following the assassination, Al Arabiya and Al Hadath reported discussions about Meshaal’s candidacy as Hamas’ political leader ahead of new elections. Sinwar, then the leader of Hamas in the Gaza Strip, opposed his appointment. He wanted to replace Haniyeh with someone who had good relations with Iran and Syria, and proposed Khalil al-Hayya, a member of the Politburo. However, Sinwar was elected as the new head of the political faction a few days later.
Sinwar was killed in an Israeli airstrike on October 17. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called his death "the beginning of the end of the war" in the Gaza Strip.