Skip to main content

Will Hamas respond to assassination of military leader?

Hamas is blaming Israel for the killing of military commander Mazen Faqha but is waiting on a commission of inquiry before announcing any response.
EDITORS NOTE: Graphic content / Yahya Sinwar (C-R), the new leader of Hamas in the Gaza Strip and senior political leaders of the Islamist movement, Ismail Haniyeh (C-L) and Rawhi Moshtaha (L-2) attend the funeral of Hamas official, Mazen Faqha in Gaza city on March 25, 2017.
Gunmen in the Gaza Strip had shot dead the Hamas official on March 24, 2017, according to Iyad al-Bozum, an interior ministry spokesman in the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip. Faqha had been released by Israel six years earlier in the 2011 pris
Read in 

Mazen Faqha, a senior member of the armed wing of Hamas, was shot and killed on March 24. In Gaza, the prevailing view is that Faqha, who was freed from an Israeli jail in a 2011 prisoner exchange deal with Hamas, was assassinated by a unit of undercover Israeli soldiers. Israel had held him responsible for activating terrorist cells in the West Bank. A preliminary investigation suggested the killers used silencers, leading senior Hamas officials to suspect that he was not shot by “enemies from within,” but by Israelis.

Faqha was killed in the area of Tel al-Hawa, known as the “Hill of Winds,” a short distance from the Gaza coast. The location suggests the killers arrived from the sea, landed on the beach and with the help of local collaborators ambushed Faqha. Hamas decided to close off the Erez crossing from Gaza into Israel, preventing Palestinians from leaving the Gaza Strip until it could ensure that the collaborators had not fled.

Access the Middle East news and analysis you can trust

Join our community of Middle East readers to experience all of Al-Monitor, including 24/7 news, analyses, memos, reports and newsletters.

Subscribe

Only $100 per year.