Israel encircles home of Hamas leader as Palestinians are warned to flee

The Israeli military has encircled the home of Hamas’ top leader in Gaza as Palestinians are warned to flee from the enclave’s southern half, officials said.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday that the IDF is closing in on the home of Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar in the city of Khan Younis, southern Gaza’s largest city where hundreds of thousands have fled to since the war began.

“His house is not his fortress, and he can escape, but it’s only a matter of time before we get him.” Netanyahu said in a statement. “Our forces can reach anywhere in the Gaza Strip.”

IDF spokesperson Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari noted that there is “terror infrastructure and headquarters” in Sinwar’s home, with the Hamas leader likely hiding underground via the group’s 300-mile-long tunnel system.  

“Our role is to reach Sinwar and kill him,” Hagari said of the IDF’s advancement in Khan Younis.

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This isn’t the first time Netanyahu and the IDF has claimed to have Sinwar, the man believed to have orchestrated the Oct. 7 massacre, trapped by advancing soldiers.

Last month, the Israeli military claimed it had closed in on Sinwar while he was isolated inside an underground bunker in Gaza City.

The hunt for Sinwar in Gaza’s second-largest city comes as leaflets were dropped from the sky warning Palestinians to flee the south, similar to those dropped amid the invasion in the north during the first phase of the war.

The conflict that consumed the north led to the displacements of 1.8 million Palestinians, about 80% of the population in Gaza, with the Human Rights Watch international group condemning the latest wave of leaflets.

“No military force in any conflict can just make an announcement and then bomb an area with no regard for civilians there — no matter how many warnings it gives and no matter in what form,” said Andrew Stroehlein, the HRW’s European and media editorial director.

He added that due to the communication blackouts in Gaza, many Palestinians will likely miss the additional warnings being sent out via phone calls and social media posts.

The leaflets being dropped over Khan Younis, specifically, included a verse from the Quran that appeared to reference the same language Hamas used when describing the Oct. 7 terrorist attack that killed more than 1,200 people, CNN reports.

“The flood overtook them, while they persisted in wrongdoing,” the leaflets read in Arabic, citing a verse from the story of Noah.

Israel and Hamas are engaging in fierce clashes in and around Khan Younis, with the terrorist group claiming it destroyed at least 23 IDF vehicles in southern Khan Younis and northern Beit Lahiya.

Meanwhile, Hagari said that IDF soldiers were fighting for the first time “in the heart” of Khan Younis, a day after Israel claimed that it has killed half of the commanders of Hamas’ 24 battalion units since the war began on Oct. 7.

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Hamdi Tanira, a resident in Khan Younis, said he and 30 others were barely able to escape an explosion from an Israeli airstrike that hit their neighborhood.

“I swear we don’t even know how we made it out alive,” he said, noting that 20 sleeping children were among those who managed to get out in time.