Sinwar’s successor in Gaza survived IDF strike, Hamas claims

Hamas says de facto Gaza chief survived Israeli assassination attempt.

By World Israel News Staff

Hamas said Monday that Ali al-Amoudi, the terror group’s de facto leader inside the Gaza Strip and a former close aide to Yahya Sinwar, survived an Israeli airstrike aimed at killing him over the weekend.

“The reports reaching us confirm that Ali al-Amoudi survived the Israeli assassination attempt,” senior Hamas official Ghazi Hamad said.

The announcement appears to confirm Israeli assessments that emerged hours after the strike indicating the operation had likely failed.

Israel targeted al-Amoudi overnight Friday into Saturday in an apartment inside a residential building in western Gaza City. Five people were killed in the attack, according to Palestinian health officials.

The IDF acknowledged carrying out the strike with the Shin Bet and said al-Amoudi had been located in an apartment “used for terror activity, inside a residential building.”

The military said it employed precision weapons and other measures intended to reduce civilian casualties.

“This is further evidence of the Hamas terror group’s hiding among the civilian population and its cynical use of them as human shields and to advance terrorist plots,” the IDF said.

Israel initially said it was examining the results of the attack. By Saturday evening, however, Israeli assessments were reportedly moving toward the conclusion that al-Amoudi had escaped death.

Hamas had stopped short of immediately announcing his condition, although sources close to the organization indicated after the attack that he remained alive.

Al-Amoudi has emerged as one of the most powerful Hamas figures still operating inside Gaza following the deaths of much of the group’s senior leadership during the war.

The IDF described him as Sinwar’s former “right-hand man and personal aide” and said he “was involved in decision-making for the October 7 massacre.”

“Today, Amoudi is the most senior Hamas figure in the Gaza Strip and is directly involved in Hamas terror activity and in rebuilding the group for war,” the military said.

Al-Amoudi previously headed Sinwar’s office and later led Hamas’s media apparatus. His influence rose further following the deaths of Sinwar, Rawhi Mushtaha and other senior figures.

He currently serves as deputy chairman of Hamas’s political bureau in Gaza and has effectively overseen the organization inside the enclave while it attempts to complete an internal leadership election.

Al-Amoudi has been competing with veteran Hamas official Nizar Awadallah for formal control of the group’s Gaza leadership. An initial round of voting reportedly failed to produce a decisive result, and a subsequent runoff was delayed amid disputes over the process.

The leadership contest became necessary after Khalil al-Hayya, previously Hamas’s chief in Gaza, was elected overall head of the organization in July.

Al-Amoudi also has a long history in Hamas dating back decades.

Israeli authorities imprisoned him in the 1990s after his involvement in terrorist attacks against Israelis.

The IDF says he was involved in the 1993 murders of four Israelis in Judea and Samaria and in a 1994 attack in Ramallah in which Shin Bet officer Noam-Menachem Cohen was killed.

He was ultimately sentenced to life imprisonment but was released in the 2011 Gilad Shalit prisoner exchange, alongside Sinwar and hundreds of other Palestinian security prisoners.

Al-Amoudi has since become directly involved in attempts to rebuild Hamas’s military and governing infrastructure following the devastation inflicted on the organization during the Gaza war.

Hamad, meanwhile, accused Israel of endangering the ceasefire through its continuing campaign against senior terrorist figures.

“The Israeli assassinations are putting the Gaza agreement at risk of collapse,” he said.

He called on Washington to intervene, adding: “The United States is responsible for saving the Gaza agreement and must pressure Israel to stop the assassinations.”

The IDF announced over the same weekend that it had killed two Islamic Jihad commanders in separate Gaza City strikes, including a commander in the group’s rocket unit and the head of an anti-tank missile squad.