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A carefully coordinated land and air attack by Hamas on Israeli territory caught the country off guard and resulted in the deaths of 900 people in Israel. The devastating attack by the Palestinian armed group has put a spotlight on Mohammed Deif, a shadowy leader of Hamas’ military wing, who was born and raised in a refugee camp in Gaza.
The fighting between Hamas and Israeli forces enters its fourth day on Tuesday as the Palestinian group which captured about 150 people in the surprise assault, threatened to execute the hostages if Israeli air strikes continue “targeting” Gaza residents.
Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel planned to carry out a “massive” assault against Hamas with “unprecedented force”.
Who is Mohammed Deif?
Mohammed Deif, a handicapped Palestinian fighter, has been the head of Hamas’s military wing since 2002. According to a report in TRT, Deif has led the Qassam Brigades, the military offshoot of Hamas since 2002.
He was born Mohammed Diab Ibrahim al-Masri in the Khan Younis refugee camp in Palestine’s Gaza during the 1960s. He got his education from the Islamic University of Gaza.
Gaza, during that point, was under Egyptian control (from 1948 to 1967). It came under the Israeli rule after the Six-Day War in June 1967, when Israel managed to capture Sinai Peninsula, Gaza Strip, West Bank, Old City of Jerusalem, and Golan Heights.
Deif’s uncle or father had reportedly participated in the 1950s raids by armed Palestinians into the same area that Hamas fighters infiltrated during the weekend attack on Saturday.
Just like Hamas’s handicapped spiritual leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, who was killed by an Israeli airstrike in 2004, Deif runs the Qassam brigades from a wheelchair in the last two decades. He is listed as a Specially Designated Global Terrorist (SDGT) by the US Department of State.
Deif’s mentor is said to be Yehya Ayyash, “the engineer” renowned for building Hamas bombs and other weaponry.
Deif’s Role in Hamas
Hamas, an Islamic Resistance Movement, was founded in 1987 during the First Intifada or Palestinian uprising following Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
According to a report in FT, Deif was in his 20s during the first intifada. He was also jailed by the Israelis, who held Deif responsible for the deaths of people during suicide bombings.
Deif’s relationship with Hamas is considered to have begun at the Islamic University of Gaza, where many Palestinian leaders joined the nation’s liberation movements during their university period. He is supposed to have joined the Qassam Brigades, shortly after the Oslo Accords, signed by Yasser Arafat, chairman of the Palestinian Liberation Organisation (PLO) in 1993 to negotiate an end to the conflict based on a two-state solution.
Mohammed Deif has long advocated attacking Israel and is reportedly uninterested in the internal Palestinian leadership struggles.
After the latest attack on Israel last week, Mohammed Deif said “Operation Al-Aqsa Storm” was in response to the “16-year blockade of Gaza, the Israeli occupation and a series of recent incidents that have brought Israeli-Palestinian tensions to a fever pitch”.
Survived Israeli Assassination Attempts
The Hamas commander has been hunted by Israel for decades and has been on the country’s “most wanted” list for more than 20 years. He was almost killed in an air strike 20 years ago that left him in a wheelchair after losing an eye, an arm and a leg.
Mohammed Deif had been at the top of Israel’s “most wanted” list for years and survived at least seven Israeli assassination attempts ever since he started leading the Qassam Brigades in 2002, in which his wife and two kids were killed.
In the year he took over, an Israeli helicopter fired missiles at a car near Gaza City in which two Hamas members were killed and 40 others were injured.
Israel admitted to attempt assassinating Deif in a targeted strike on a house in 2014, during which his wife and children were killed.
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