US dollars and plenty of supplies
Hamas leader’s suspected hideout discovered
February 14, 2024, 3:06 a.m
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Jihia al-Sinwar is the head of Hamas in the Gaza Strip. It is unknown where the alleged mastermind of the massacre in Israel is currently located. Video footage is said to show him and his family in a tunnel under Khan Yunis shortly after the attack. Pictures from his alleged hiding place suggest a hasty escape.
The Israeli army says it has discovered an abandoned hideout belonging to the leader of the Islamist Hamas in the Gaza Strip, Jihia al-Sinwar. In the tunnel section under the southern city of Khan Yunis, Al-Sinwar lived with his family and Hamas fighters while the war raged above them, said Israeli army spokesman Daniel Hagari and published a short statement Video of a tour of the suspected hiding place.
In it, an Israeli soldier shows a room where Al-Sinwar is said to have lived, complete with numerous perfume bottles and a safe full of banknotes in Israeli and US currency amounting to millions of dollars. The information on the video could not initially be independently verified. The complex also included several toilets and showers, a kitchen where supplies would have been kept for a long time, and a room for bodyguards with weapons and ammunition. “Everything was left behind here,” says the soldier. Al-Sinwar and his people “ran away” when they heard that Israel’s military was approaching, the short video continues. “We are determined to catch him and we will catch him,” Hagari said.
Video is said to show Al-Sinwar and family
The Israeli military is releasing another short video that is supposed to show Al-Sinwar and some of his relatives. It was said that the video was recorded on October 10th – three days after the attack on Israel – by a surveillance camera in one of the Hamas tunnels in Khan Yunis. In the short shot, a man can be seen from behind walking through the section of tunnel captured by the camera, whose silhouette resembles that of Al-Sinwar.
According to the military, the other people seen are Al-Sinwar’s wife and children. The only person visible from the front is said to be Al-Sinwar’s brother Ibrahim. “So he escaped with his family from an underground tunnel into a secure complex that he had built in advance,” Hagari said. The authenticity of the video could not initially be independently confirmed. If it is authentic, these would be the first images of the Hamas leader since the start of the war.
Khan Yunis in the south of the Gaza Strip was considered a Hamas stronghold. The Israeli armed forces have been deployed there for several weeks and, according to their own statements, have largely destroyed the Hamas militia groups active there.
Earlier this month, family members from the inner circle of Hamas’ senior military leadership in the Gaza Strip and those close to Al-Sinwar were arrested on suspicion of involvement in terrorist activities, Hagari said. These include, among others, the father of Hamas brigade commander Rafa Salama. The interrogations of those arrested provided Israel’s security services with important information, it said.