THE ISRAELI MILITARY has said that it killed Hamas military chief Mohammed Deif in a strike it carried out last month in Gaza’s southern area of Khan Younis.

“The IDF (Israeli army) announces that on July 13th, 2024, IDF fighter jets struck in the area of Khan Yunis, and following an intelligence assessment, it can be confirmed that Mohammed Deif was eliminated in the strike,” a military statement said.

Israel targeted Deif in the strike which hit a compound on the outskirts of the southern Gaza city of Khan Younis, but there had been no immediate confirmation he was killed at the time. 

Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu acknowledged hours after the attack that there was “no certainty” that Deif and one of his deputies, Rafa Salama, had been killed.

More than 90 other people, including displaced civilians in nearby tents, were killed in the strike, Gaza health officials said at the time.

We can now confirm: Mohammed Deif was eliminated.

— Israel Defense Forces (@IDF) August 1, 2024

Deif has been among Israel’s most wanted for nearly three decades and on a US list of “international terrorists” since 2015. He has survived at least six previous attempts on his life.

He was born in a refugee camp in Khan Younis in 1965. His real name is Mohammed Diab al-Masri.

Deif means “visitor” or “guest”, and some say this is because he is always on the move with Israeli hunters on his trail.

Few photographs of him are known to exist. In January, Israel announced a new photo of Deif had been found, without specifying when it was taken. In videos, Deif normally appears masked or shown in a silhouette.

He has been involved in Hamas since the 1980s when he was a student at the Gaza Islamic University and changed his name. He left with a degree in biology but turned to engineering and it’s thought he played a key role in overseeing the construction of the tunnels built beneath Gaza.

He is also said to have taken part in many Hamas operations, including the abduction of Israeli soldiers and the planning of suicide bombings.

He was detained by Israel around 1989 and spent about two years in a prison run by Yasser Arafat’s Palestinian Authority. He was released or escaped, reports say.

One of the founders of Hamas’s military wing, the Qassam Brigades, in the 1990s, Deif led the unit for decades.

He went to the top of Israel’s wanted list in 1995, accused of killing Israeli soldiers and civilians.

In May, the chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court requested a warrant for his arrest, alongside Sinwar and Qatar-based Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh for war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The ICC prosecutor also applied for warrants against Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant.

© AFP 2024