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Since the deadly attacks on October 7 that killed more than 1,400 people in southern Israel, Israeli authorities have been targeting Hamas leaders. The militant Islamist group, founded in 1987 during the first Palestinian intifada, has ruled the Gaza Strip since 2007. FRANCE 24 takes a look at some of the key figures now at the top of Israel’s hit list.
Mohammed Deif, Israel’s public enemy No. 1
Suspected by Tel Aviv of being the mastermind behind the October 7 attacks, Mohammed Deif is the commanding officer of Hamas’s military wing – the Izz el-Deen al-Qassam Brigades – and has been leading Hamas’s military operations since 2002. He joined the group in the late 1980s after a spell at the head of the Muslim Brotherhood’s student union and has been a main target of the Israeli intelligence services for more than 30 years.
Deif was born in the Khan Younis refugee camp in Gaza in 1960 and trained alongside Yahya Ayyash, a Hamas military leader who was assassinated by Israel’s internal security service Shin Beit in 1996.
© AFP
It was under Deif’s command that the al-Qassam Brigades acquired sophisticated rockets and began launching land incursions from the Gaza Strip through underground tunnels. Israel accused him of being the mastermind behind the suicide bombings that targeted Israeli civilians in the mid-1990s and from 2000 to 2006.
Deif was born under the name Mohammed al-Masri. His alias “el-Deif” means “the Guest” in Arabic and refers to his tendency to change hideouts frequently. He is also known as Mohammed Diab or under his nom de guerre Abu Khaled. The most recent known photo of Deif…
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Source : france24
