Mohammed Deif Is Dead

Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant announced today the Israel Defense Forces have killed Mohammed Deif, leader of Gaza’s military, on July 13.

Who was Deif? Deif was leader of the Al-Qassam Brigades, Hamas’s equivalent of a military. A longtime figure in Hamas, Deif masterminded the 1996 Jaffa Road bus bombings in Jerusalem that killed 45 people. He was one of the figures most responsible for planning and executing the Oct. 7, 2023, terror attack against Israel.

The Israel Defense Forces (idf) hunted him down for so long that it gave him a nickname: “the cat with nine lives.”

Others: News of Deif’s death came after the (most likely) Israeli assassination of Hamas’s overall leader, Ismail Haniyeh, in Tehran, Iran. Many other senior Hamas figures have fallen to Israel over the past few months.

What does this mean? With an idf presence over most of Gaza, most Hamas military units dissolved, and much of its senior leadership dead, Israel has all but won the war. The question still stands, however: What will Israel do with Gaza after the war?

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu indicated his vision for Gaza in his speech to the United States Congress on July 24. Whatever happens, we could soon see some big changes on the ground in Gaza.

Learn more: Read “A Big Flaw in Netanyahu’s Great Vision.”