IDF spokesman, Brigadier General Daniel Hagari announced this evening (Tuesday) that the head of Hamas’s military wing, Marwan Issa, was killed in an attack on an underground compound in the center of the Gaza Strip. Marwan Issa was number 3 in the terrorist organization Hamas and the deputy of Muhammad Daf. He was in charge of the organization’s military activities, one of the architects of the October 7 massacre and involved in the Gilad Shalit kidnapping organization. US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan confirmed that Issa was killed in an IDF attack carried out on March 9, 2024 in the center of the Gaza Strip. Hamas has yet to admit that he was killed.
Marwan Issa, photo: IDF spokesman
The deputy commander of the military wing in Hamas and the planners of the October 7 massacre. Involved in a series of terrorist attacks. Including suicide bombings that he led as revenge for the assassination of senior Hamas official Yahya Ayash. He also serves as a member of the Political Bureau in Gaza, the governing body, and is responsible for the coordination between it and the Gaza ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades. Also referred to as Abu al-Bara’.
Issa was born in 1965 in the al-Boreij refugee camp, in the center of the Gaza Strip, excelled in basketball and was a member of the Muslim Brotherhood. He was arrested in the first intifada, and spent a total of five years in an Israeli prison. He was later transferred to a PA prison for four years. He was finally released in the second intifada. Considered a protégé of one of the founders of Hamas, Ibrahim Makadama.
Documentation from the scene of the assassination of Issa and Abu Tamaa
Upon his release from prison, Issa was one of the figures who led the transition of the al-Zadeen al-Qassam Brigades from terrorist cells to a military organization – divided into battalions, brigades and command areas. All these were subordinated under a chain of command headed by the military council. The one where members are Muhammad Daf, Issa himself, Ahmed Randour, Ayman Nofal and Muhammad Sinwar. In 2005, Issa and his men took over a prison in Gaza, murdering three prisoners from the Fatah organization.
Before the disengagement plan, Issa was entrusted with directing attacks against the settlement blocs in the Gaza Strip. He was appointed to the position of deputy of the military branch after his predecessor, Ahmed Jabri, was eliminated in Operation Pillar of Heaven. Even earlier, he was injured in an assassination attempt but survived. In the following years, he was entrusted with advancing the capabilities of the terrorist organization, including invasion operations, the development of rockets and the establishment of an array of drones.
First picture of the senior who was eliminated
The IDF spokesman also allowed publication that the head of Hamas’ combat and administrative assistance headquarters, Razi Abu Tamaa, was also killed in Gaza in the same apartment as Marwan Issa. Abu Tamaa was a senior figure in the terrorist organization’s mechanisms and took part in planning the war against Israel.
Abu Tamaa, photo: IDF spokesman
Razi Abu Tama’a served as the commander of the military arm “Ezz ad-Din Al-Qassem Brigades” in the refugee camps in the center of the Gaza Strip. That is, he commanded four battalions of terrorists in the camps, two of which have already been disbanded. According to the IDF spokesman, he was also responsible for all of Hamas’s weapons in the Gaza Strip. Unlike other Hamas officials, Abu Tama’a keeps an extremely low public profile and there are no pictures of him in the media.
In 2008, Egypt arrested Ayman Nofal, commander of the center camp in Hamas, who was traveling with his companions in the border area between the Gaza Strip and the Sinai Peninsula. He sat in the Egyptian prison until January 2011 – then he managed to be released under the auspices of the “Arab Spring” riots.
The scene of the assassination of the apartment where Abu Hamaa stayed with Issa, photo: Arab Networks
During this period, Abu Tamaa stepped into his shoes as the commander of the camps. When Nofal returned to the Strip, he had a conflict with Abu Tamaa due to a power struggle and his desire to return to his previous position. It so happened that in 2015, a Palestinian source revealed to the Egyptian press that the military council tried to please Nofal – and appointed him to be a member of it. A kind of initial consolation prize alongside his role as a coordinator between the terrorist organizations in the Gaza Strip.
Three senior terrorist operatives were arrested in Shifa
In addition, the IDF spokesman announced that three terrorist operatives were arrested during the raid on Shifa Hospital: Radwan Younes Kamal Tapesh, who is in charge of the engraving section and the production system of the Islamic Jihad, Bakr Ahmed Bakr Kanita, head of a section in the Hamas Security and Safety Directorate and deputy in charge of a case The finance and procurement department of Hamas.
Details of the terrorists arrested by IDF forces in a raid in Shifa, photo: IDF spokesperson
At the end of his statement, the IDF spokesman referred to the publication of the testimony of Amit Sosna, who was released from captivity: “Amit’s courage, her personality and her choice to bring her testimony to the world is heroic. Amit is a real hero. This is further evidence that the IDF and the security forces must continue to work for the return of the abductees. Every day in captivity is an eternity for them.”
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