An extensive report on NBC News on Wednesday askes Where is Sinwar. The Hamas leader, believed to be the architect of the October 7 massacre has succeeded in staying one step ahead of the IDF and Israeli intelligence agencies, the network said.
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The report quotes current and former senior IDF officers and security officials who said that Yahya Sinwar was likely moving from place to place. NBC said he was likely hiding somewhere in the vast tunnel system Hamas built beneath Gaza, while the IDF surrounded his home town of Khan Younis although the Israeli sources said they could not rule out the possibility that he had escaped Gaza, perhaps to Egypt, using yet another tunnel under the border.
The officials told NBC that Sinwar and others in the leadership of the terror group most probably hid in a tunnel that was found containing caged cells to hold the hostages.
“It is a fair assumption that Sinwar and Hamas leadership were close to where those hostages were kept — and then they all moved on,” former IDF spokesperson Jonathan Conricus told NBC. “I think being close to hostages has saved his life more than once.” Conricus is today a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington-based policy institute.
According to the report, Sinwar goes to great lengths to to communications with Hamas political leaders in Qatar secret from Israeli intelligence. Israeli officials said the idea floated by the government, to allow Sinwar to safely leave Gaza in exchange for the release of the Israeli hostages held there, was ill advised.
“If he lives abroad and supervises the remaining leaders of Hamas in Gaza and Hamas gets a role in a future arrangement in Gaza, well that amplifies his victory on Oct 7,” one official told the network.
Former Deputy National Security Advisor Jacob Nagel told NBC that he believed Sinwar would never release all of the hostages. “He’ll keep some of the hostages forever because this will be his insurance policy that no one will kill him.”
Other officials said Sinwar has three goals. One is to survive, the other is to ensure the survival of Hamas and the third is to ensure that Hamas plays a role in the governing of Gaza after the war.
Gershon Baskin, who was involved in negotiations to free IDF soldier Gilad Shalit, held for five years in Hamas captivity told the network that Sinwar was not afraid to die a martyrs death but would not agree to an exile from Gaza.