We republish below an unofficial translation of the following article from the Brazilian New Democratic newspaper A Nova Democracia, originally published on October 17, 2024.
Sinwar has seen, for a year and ten days, the successes of his operation, through which he has imposed the Palestinian cause on the world, and continues to defeat politically, economically and militarily the Zionist State of Israel and continues to mobilize, in an unprecedented way, the anti-imperialist forces of the Middle East and the rest of the world.
With his favorite military clothes, grenades on his belt, rifle in hand and a Palestinian scarf around his neck, Yahya Sinwar, the Hamas leader responsible for mounting Operation Al-Aqsa Flood, died today (10/17), on the front line of combat with Zionist troops in the Tal al-Sultan neighborhood of Rafah. The leader was protecting, with other Palestinian fighters, the southern Gaza Strip city, where millions of refugees expelled from other areas of the narrow territory live.
Hamas declared between Oct. 17 and Oct. 18 that Sinwar died “as a heroic martyr, advancing and never retreating, carrying his weapon, defying and confronting the occupying army on the front lines.” “He moved between all the fighting positions, quickly and stationed in the honored land of Gaza.”
Hamas further stated that “the martyrdom of brother and leader Yahya Al-Sinwar, along with all the leaders and icons of the movement who preceded him on the path of honor, martyrdom and the project of liberation and return, will only strengthen Hamas and our Resistance, making us more determined and firm in following his path, honoring his blood and sacrifice.”
The head of International Relations of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), Maher Al-Taher, told the Lebanese website Al-Mayadeen on October 17 that “Yahya Sinwar fought honorably and was martyred while carrying his weapon.” The PFLP issued a statement on 10/18.
As a sign of the unity of the Palestinian National Resistance, several other Palestinian military groups and organizations honored Sinwar’s death with statements. All reinforced the leader’s decision to take the path of armed struggle. Among them are the Al-Qassam Brigades (Hamas), Saraya Al-Quds – West Bank (Palestinian Islamic Jihad), Palestinian Islamic Jihad, Abu Ali Mustafa Martyr Brigades (PFLP), Al-Nasser Salah Al-Din Brigades, Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades (split from Fatah that took part in the armed struggle) and others. From outside Palestine, Hezbollah (Lebanon), Ansarallah (Yemen) and Islamic Resistance in Iraq were some of those who paid tribute to Sinwar and promised to continue on the path of anti-Zionist armed struggle.
Al-Mayadeen itself, a prominently pro-Resistance newspaper, confirmed the death of the Palestinian leader, in an editorial entitled The fighter until his last breath… Yahya Al-Sinwar.
Israel’s Zionist Army has released drone footage of what it says are Sinwar’s last moments. In it, a Palestinian man, already missing an arm and covered in dust from the bombings, seems to use the little energy to throw an iron bar at the Israeli object.
This article will remain open to the statements of other organizations.
Yahya Sinwar: A life dedicated to armed struggle
Yahya Sinwar dedicated his entire life to the defense of a free and sovereign Palestine, always through armed struggle. He spent more than 20 years captive in Israeli prisons. He was released in 2011 by means of arms, since it was the capture of the Zionist soldier Gilad Shalit by Hamas’s Al-Qassam Brigades that ensured that Sinwar was released along with 1,000 other prisoners in exchange for the Israeli prisoner of war.
In 2017, Sinwar took over the leadership of Hamas in Gaza, a role he held until August 2024, when he replaced former Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh, who was assassinated by Israel in Tehran. Even with the promotion, Sinwar did not leave Gaza, nor the front line of the anti-Zionist fighting. A marked difference from the Zionist commanders, many of whom resigned because they could not bear the losses caused by the Palestinian guerrilla war.
Yahya Sinwar was also the main person responsible for having set up, together with commanders such as Mohammed Deif (chief of staff of the Al-Qassam Brigades), Operation Al-Aqsa Flood. He saw, for a year and ten days, the successes of his operation, which imposed the Palestinian cause on the world, and caused important political, economic and military defeats to the Zionist State of Israel and mobilized the anti-imperialist forces of the Middle East to an unprecedented level.
Sinwar was also responsible for setting up Al-Majd, Hamas’s military service for internal security and counterintelligence. In 2014, he politically and militarily coordinated the Al-Qassam Brigades during the 2014 Gaza War.
Throughout his life, Sinwar advocated armed struggle more than once and made it clear that he was not afraid to die. “Does the world expect us to raise the white flag? That will not happen. Does the world expect us to be well-behaved victims while we are being killed? That we are massacred without making a sound? That’s impossible,” he told Vice.
On another occasion, during a press conference in May 2021, Sinwar said that Netanyahu could kill him right then and there. “He (Netanyahu) will say that this is the photo of victory and the end of the battle. That we ‘murdered’ Sinwar,” he said. “He wants an image of victory, I’m ready. They can make the decision to assassinate me right now. I’m not going to blink. Make yourself comfortable.”
International solidarity
Solidarity with Hamas reached, on the 17th, international levels. The Palestinian Arab Federation of Brazil (Fepal) released a statement with the title Assassinating Sinwar will not stop the end of Zionism and the liberation of Palestine.
“Contrary to what the Zionists and their vassals in the Western press have sold for more than a year, Yahya Sinwar was not ‘in a tunnel surrounded by hostages and security guards’, but rather died with weapons drawn, on the front line of the resistance against the genocides of Tel Aviv, who were armed by the equally murderous and cowardly Washington, London and Berlin,” said Fepal.
“While cowards like Netanyahu and his partners in the Palestinian genocide will come out of the manholes in which they hide straight into the latrine of history, Sinwar will be remembered as a martyr and hero of the Palestinian people.”
“The Palestinian people have the primacy of being masters of their own destiny, their victory and their invincibility. While Palestinians are murdered to prevent the end of the Zionist colonial project in Palestine, which counts its final days, Palestinians are recognized around the world as victims of a televised extermination and a heroic and invincible people,” Fepal concluded.
An inevitable part of the war
Sinwar’s death is a heavy loss for the ranks of Hamas, the Al-Qassam Brigades and the international anti-imperialist struggle. It is not, however, a coup that will make the Hamas Resistance and its military organization unfeasible or cool down, nor the Palestinian National Resistance as a whole.
The loss of important cadres is an inevitable part of any war of liberation, conscientiously undertaken by those involved in it. History is full of examples.
Karakoz Abdaliev (who killed 72 Nazi soldiers and destroyed two tanks), Tatyana Baramzina (sniper who died after taking part in a heroic roadblock operation and deciding to stay behind to defend wounded comrades), Vera Belik (lieutenant who died after successfully completing a bombing operation) and Yakov Djugashvili (eldest son of communist leader Joseph Stalin, who left his career as an engineer to defend the country and died in a Nazi concentration camp) were some of the cadres of the Red Army of Workers and Peasants of the Soviet Union who gave their lives for the liberation of the Soviet territories occupied by Hitlerite Germany.
The same happened in the People’s War in China against Japanese imperialism and Kuomintang fascism, or in the Korean War against the USA. Dong Cunrui was a Chinese communist soldier who blew himself up to destroy a Kuomintang bunker in 1948. Mao Anying, Mao Tse-tung’s son, died as a volunteer in the Korean War.
The anti-Zionist war in the Middle East itself has cost cadres of organizations such as Hamas, the PFLP and Hezbollah. Hamas lost its former chief, Ismail Haniyeh, and a senior commander, Saleh Al-Arouri, as well as other members and deployed fighters. Imad Odeh, commander of the PFLP, was also assassinated, while Hezbollah lost names such as Fouad Shukr and the organization’s own historical leader, Hassan Nasrallah.
None of these losses led to the defeat of the belligerent revolutionary armies. The construction of these forces by the popular masses and the revolutionary leadership over the military organizations allows for a rapid reorganization of inflamed fighters by those who fall in the name of liberation.
Sinwar’s death, weapons in hand and covered with the dust of rubble and fighting, was a defeat for Israel, since the death of any revolutionary leader in these conditions inflames others into taking up posts of combat readiness.
Photo: Yahya Sinwar in the midst of the masses in Gaza. Photo: Ashraf Amra/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
