Hamas says it won’t reveal identity of new leader

The group’s chief negotiator is reportedly a frontrunner to succeed Yahya Sinwar

Hamas will choose a new leader in March but will keep his identity a secret for security reasons, a spokesman for the Palestinian militant group has said. Until then, the group will be run by a committee of top officials.

The Gaza-based militant group has been without an overall leader since last Wednesday, when Yahya Sinwar was killed in a firefight with Israeli troops in Rafah. Sinwar, who previously served as the movement’s chief in Gaza, assumed the top position in August, after the head of the Hamas political bureau, Ismail Haniyeh, was assassinated in Tehran.

With the commander of the group’s military wing, Mohammed Deif, killed in an Israeli airstrike in Gaza in July, overall leadership duties have been handed to a five-man committee, a Hamas spokesman told the BBC on Monday.

This committee will be made up of Khalil al-Hayya, Khaled Meshaal, Zaher Jabarin, Muhammad Darwish, and a fifth unnamed individual, the spokesman said. Once a new leader is chosen, he added, his name will be kept under wraps for security reasons.

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Khalil al-Hayya is based in Qatar and currently heads the Hamas delegation in ceasefire talks with Israel. Al-Hayya acknowledged Sinwar’s death in a video message last week, describing the slain militant as a “holy warrior” and “fallen martyr.”

Two Hamas officials told the BBC that al-Hayya has assumed many of Sinwar’s duties, and is considered a strong candidate to replace him atop the organization.

Alongside Deif, Sinwar was widely regarded as the mastermind behind the October 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel that prompted the ongoing war. “Sinwar was responsible for the most brutal attack against Israel in our history,” Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesman Daniel Hagari said in a televised statement last week. “For the past year, Sinwar tried to escape justice. He failed. We said we would find him and bring him to justice, and we did.”

Hamas maintains that it will continue waging war against Israel and will not free the roughly 100 hostages it holds in Gaza until Israel withdraws from the enclave and releases scores of Palestinian prisoners in its jails. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the UN General Assembly last month that if Hamas does not surrender, the IDF will keep fighting “until we achieve total victory.”