Current and former Israeli officials said in interviews that the Israeli operation in Gaza could not end until Sinwar was arrested, killed, or no longer able to run the organization. Emphasizing the necessity of eliminating the terrorist leader, and the extent to which the war depends on the success of that mission, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at a meeting of his Likud party earlier this month: “We will kill the leadership of Hamas. … We must not end the war before that time.”
But locating Sinwar may not be as difficult, tactically or politically, as launching a military operation to neutralize him without killing or wounding many of the hostages believed to be nearby, according to Israeli, American and other Western intelligence and security officials who described Sinwar's location as terrorist. The difficult search for the wanted man in Israel. Many spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive information and operations.
“It's not about locating him, it's about doing something” without risking the lives of the hostages, one senior Israeli official said.
Sinwar is believed to be hiding in Warren Tunnels under Khan Yunis, the southern Gaza town where he was born in 1962 to a family forced out of the Palestinian town of Majdal, now Ashkelon, following Israel's 1948 war for independence. American officials said they agreed with the Israeli assessment that Sinwar was hiding somewhere. Under his hometown and surrounding himself with hostages, it is the ultimate insurance policy.
Officials said that on October 7, Hamas kidnapped more than 250 civilians and soldiers from Israel and took them to Gaza. Hamas has released more than 100 of them. About 130 hostages are still being held, an estimate that includes the bodies of about two dozen people who Israeli authorities have determined are dead. About six of the remaining hostages are Americans.
For months, Israeli military and security services have been mapping a vast network of tunnels under Gaza in an attempt to understand key points in the network and find Sinwar. This painstaking work is being carried out by soldiers working inside the tunnels, who have recovered information left behind by Hamas fighters that has helped better understand the interconnected underground system.
As soldiers moved through the tunnels, dismantling booby traps along the way, they discovered Hamas administrative files, computers and telephone directories pointing to various “offices” in the network, officials said.
Defense Minister Yoav Galant said in public statements earlier this month that Israeli soldiers also discovered evidence that Sinwar may have been one step ahead of them. According to Israeli press reports, the soldiers found Sinwar's clothes, notes that he was writing in his own handwriting, and even a toothbrush that he may have used.
In recent days, some officials have speculated that Sinwar may have moved a few miles away to Rafah, on the border with Egypt. Israeli officials have publicly denied press allegations that Sinwar escaped across the border.
Besides interrogating captured Hamas fighters, information found by Israeli underground forces helped further understand the tunnel routes. U.S. intelligence analysts are helping with some of the tunnel mapping, contributing powerful analytical techniques that integrate pieces of information, according to officials familiar with the work.
But searching, clearing and shutting down the massive network, which some experts believe could be up to 450 miles long, takes a lot of time and material. Destroying even short lengths of tunnels requires large amounts of explosives. Officials explained that Israeli forces are looking for points that, once destroyed, could render other corridors through which they pass effectively inoperable.
U.S. intelligence agencies also helped analyze intercepted communications and data from recovered computer hard drives as well as information from interrogations, the officials said.
This cooperation may help in the search for Sinwar. But there are no U.S. intelligence personnel on the ground in Gaza, and the Americans are not assisting Israel in daily efforts to locate and strike Hamas fighters and their facilities, American and Israeli officials said. A former Mossad officer who maintains close ties with the current leadership said that the Israelis do not need help from the Americans to fight the war.
“The question itself is insulting,” the former officer said.
The Director of the Central Intelligence Agency, William J. Burns played a leading role, alongside his Israeli counterpart, Mossad chief David Barnea, in negotiating the release of the hostages. The two agencies have long exchanged intelligence relating to terrorist groups, Iran and other areas of concern to their security.
Negotiations continue for a six-week cessation of fighting and the release of civilian hostages, with Israeli and American officials expressing some optimism. “We are all working on it,” Netanyahu said Sunday on CBS’ “Face the Nation,” after meetings last week in Paris of negotiators from the United States, Qatar, Egypt and Israel. “We want it, I want it,” he said. “If Hamas backs down from its fictitious claims… then we will achieve the progress we all want.”
Israel rejected Hamas's demands to release large numbers of Palestinian prisoners in exchange for the release of hostages, and for at least 500 trucks loaded with humanitarian aid to enter Gaza daily. Israeli media reported that the Israeli Defense Cabinet, after the negotiators informed it of the results of the Paris meetings, agreed on Saturday to send a delegation to the talks scheduled to begin Monday in Qatar.
Public interest in Sinwar's whereabouts and fate was renewed on February 13, when the Israeli military released what it said was security camera footage of Sinwar inside a tunnel beneath Khan Yunis, the city where officials believe Sinwar is now located. A military spokesman said the video, which the Israeli army recently obtained from a Hamas camera, showed Sinwar walking with his wife, children and brother through a dark corridor on their way to a hideout, three days after the Hamas attack in October.
The footage provided Israelis with a rare, close-up look at the secret leader's personal life. This was another indication that the Israeli army may be approaching its position.
Whether Sinwar was able to command forces while underground is a matter of debate. The senior Israeli official said that Sinwar is still calling the shots and making decisions in the war. But recently, Gallant has publicly questioned the extent of control Sinwar exercises over his forces, given that he is in hiding. “He is not running the military campaign but is engaged in personal survival,” Gallant said in statements earlier this month.
Some officials, including Gallant, noted that the hostage negotiations had been slow to make progress because of the time it took to send messages between Hamas' political leadership outside Israel and Sinwar and his forces in Gaza.
Killing Sinwar would be a major strategic and symbolic victory for Israel. But some experts question whether eliminating a single leader would bring the government closer to Netanyahu's stated goal of completely destroying Hamas, which critics say is an ill-defined and unrealistic goal.
“Killing Sinwar would be an exercise of pure justice. “He actually deserved to die more than once,” said Alon Pinkas, a veteran Israeli diplomat and former senior adviser. “For Israelis, he represents the embodiment of evil, but there should be no doubt that his capture will not lead to the ‘eradication’, ‘annihilation’ or ‘overthrow’ of Hamas. Nor will it represent a victory. It would be justified revenge imposed on one man.” “And it will make the Israelis feel that there is justice and some degree of closure. Nothing more, nothing less.”
Many Israeli citizens criticized Netanyahu for prioritizing the annihilation of Hamas over the return of the remaining hostages. In a remarkable display of division at the highest levels of government, Gadi Eisenkot, a member of Israel's war cabinet and former IDF chief of staff, said last month that the complete destruction of Hamas was unrealistic.
Eisenkot acknowledged that Israeli forces dealt a “major blow” to Hamas and its capabilities in northern Gaza, where independent experts say more than two-thirds of buildings may have been damaged or destroyed. But “those who talk about absolute defeat and lack of will [on the part of Hamas] And ability does not tell the truth,” he told Israel’s Channel 12 news.
Privately, some Israeli officials have expressed similar frustration with a goal they see as unnecessarily absolute. They say it is more feasible, and still acceptable, to weaken Hamas as a military organization — by killing its leaders, along with enough fighters, that it will never be able to launch another attack on the scale of October 7.
Israeli and American officials gave different accounts about the number of Hamas fighters killed by Israeli forces and the number of brigades neutralized. The expected operation against the southern city of Rafah, on the border with Egypt, is widely seen as the final push by the Israeli army to destroy the remaining groups of organized Hamas fighters.
But Sinwar's fate remains decisive for the outcome of the war, even if the definition of victory changes. An Arab official said that some officials involved in talks about a potential settlement have discussed allowing Sinwar to leave Gaza and go into exile, although it remains unclear whether he would agree and what country, if any, would be willing to accept him.
Another former Mossad officer, who remains in close contact with his colleagues, said that the killing of Sinwar and his aides was important, but only one part of a broader demand to destroy Hamas's military capacity, for which the attack on Rafah is essential.
A person close to the Israeli senior leadership said that removing Sinwar would not end the war, but it could hasten the demise of Hamas.
“This, in our estimation, will encourage more Gazans to speak out and take responsibility without enthusiasm,” this person said. It would sever vital ties between Hamas and its international network. “We know, of course, that someone else will replace him, but that will either divide or significantly weaken Hamas.”
Many Israelis would describe this as a victory.
Harris reported from Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Washington. Missy Ryan, John Hudson and Karen de Jong in Washington and Shira Rubin in Tel Aviv contributed to this report.
