Hamas: Dead men tunneling

Hamas is not yet running on empty. But the ISIS-like terrorist organization is on the run from the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) in the Gaza Strip, and globally from Mossad — Israel’s far-reaching Institute for Intelligence and Special Operations. Consequently, Hamas now finds itself to be a group of dead men — literally and figuratively — tunneling across the region to try and survive to fight another day.

IDF officials confirm upwards of 5,000 Hamas fighters have been killed — approximately 17 percent of the Islamic militant group’s pre-Oct. 7 force of 30,000 men. Senior Hamas military leaders in Gaza, including Mohammed Deif and Yahya Sinwar, top Israel’s kill list. Hamas’s political leaders, such as chairman of the Hamas Political Bureau Ismail Haniyeh, are being actively pursued by Mossad.

Sinwar, the alleged mastermind behind the terror attack against Israel, is believed to have now fled southward from the ruins of Gaza City “by hiding in a humanitarian convoy” to the Hamas stronghold of Khan Younis, Gaza’s second largest city in the southern part of the strip. On Sunday, the IDF dropped leaflets over the city offering a $1 million reward for the whereabouts of Sinwar, his brother Mohmmad, Rafa’a Salame, and Deif.

The last thing Washington or Brussels needs to be doing now is putting pressure on Israel to agree to a ceasefire. As one unnamed U.S. senior official aptly noted, Sinwar’s “days are numbered,” as are those of Hamas. 

Jerusalem is coming for Sinwar and Hamas. Channeling former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir and her “Wrath of God” operation that targeted the Palestinian perpetrators of the 1972 massacre of 11 Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics, Shin Bet and Mossad in late October established a new unit named Nili, a Hebrew acronym for “The Eternity of Israel Will Not Lie.”

“Nili,” as a kinetic task force, is committed to “hunting down and eliminating every individual who played a role in the massacre” of Oct. 7. Nili is already having an immediate effect. There are reports that key Hamas political and military leaders are fleeing “their luxury safe haven in Doha, the Qatari capital.” 

Salah al-Arouri, the head of Hamas’ “military wing” in the Palestinian Authority-controlled West Bank, appears to have fled Beirut opting to decamp to Turkey. Khaled Meshal, Haniyeh’s predecessor, has largely stayed under the radar since mid-October. For now, Moussa Abu Marzouk remains in Qatar.

Abu Marzouk, the deputy chair of the Hamas Political Bureau, obliquely hinted at recognizing Israel in a Dec. 13 interview with Al-Monitor in exchange for Israel halting its war against Hamas. When asked about Israel, he said “You should follow the official stance. The official stance is that the [Palestine Liberation Organization] has recognized the state of Israel.”

It is doubtful Abu Marzouk is serious. Rather, he is likely confronting the growing reality that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu intends to follow through on his promise to destroy Hamas at whatever cost necessary — and is playing for time now that Hamas finds itself in survival mode. As Ronen Bar, Shin Bet’s director commented, “We will look for them everywhere: in Gaza, in the West Bank, in Lebanon, in Turkey, in Qatar, everywhere. It will take a few years, but we will do it.”

Tea and sympathy are all Hamas is ostensibly getting from its “friends,” and that includes Turkey’s Recep Erdoğan. Despite inflammatory rhetoric including accusing Israel of “committing “massacres” in Gaza” and arguing Hamas is “fighting for liberation,” Turkey’s overall diplomatic and economic relationship has remained largely unchanged since Israel began its military operations in Gaza. 

Yet Hamas sees an opening and it is coming from a very unexpected direction: Washington. As the exigencies of the 2024 presidential election cycle take hold, there is growing animosity between the Biden Administration and Israel on the tactics employed to bring the war to a conclusion.

Biden is now urging restraint from Israel in Gaza. National Security Council Strategic Communications Coordinator John Kirby has said Washington is trying to persuade Jerusalem to transition from “high intensity to lower intensity military operations” in order to reduce the rate of Palestinian civilian casualties. A senior IDF official responded, “Israel does not need to be told by the United States to avoid killing civilians.”

Hamas bears responsibility for the high civilian death rate in Gaza, just as it is responsible for civilian deaths in Israel. Unnamed Israeli military officials estimate that for every Hamas fighter killed, two Palestinian civilians have been killed. Unlike Sinwar and Deif, Israel is not targeting noncombatants. Hamas, however, is staging kinetic operations against the IDF and launching rocket attacks on Israel from civilian-use buildings and facilities in Gaza — schools, hospitals, mosques, and the like. 

Conversely, Hamas is endeavoring to markedly increase and leverage Palestinian civilian casualties in violation of the Geneva Conventions. Sinwar, Deif, and Haniyeh are trying to obtain at the negotiating table what they cannot achieve militarily: a long-term ceasefire that preserves Hamas’ existence. 

If future generations of Palestinians are to be spared the fate now tragically befalling civilians in Gaza, then Hamas must be eradicated in the here and now. No lasting two-state solution will ever be possible as long as Hamas and its leaders survive.

There are times in history when a clear win is the only path to peace. Now is such a time in the Middle East. As Netanyahu has stated many times, “Hamas must be destroyed.”

Col. (Ret.) Jonathan Sweet served 30 years as a military intelligence officer and led the U.S. European Command Intelligence Engagement Division from 2012 to 2014. Mark Toth, an economist and entrepreneur, is a former board member of the World Trade Center, St. Louis.