How Israel decimated Hamas and Hezbollah leadership in three months
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One by one, Israel has tracked, targeted and eliminated the leadership of its greatest regional enemies in a sprawling decapitation operation with little precedent in modern history.
Why it matters: The killing of Oct. 7 mastermind Yahya Sinwar this past week capped an astonishing three-month streak in which a succession of top Hamas and Hezbollah leaders, as well as several Iranian generals, were taken out by Israel.
The series of killings, a year after the Oct. 7 Hamas terrorist attacks, has dealt a crippling blow to the so-called "axis of resistance" Iran has been building, arming and funding for years.
- While the death of Sinwar marked the most important symbolic victory, it was distinct in that it was not a targeted assassination — and not the product of a sophisticated operation or pinpoint secret intelligence.
Driving the news: One of Israel's top goals since the start of the war has been to kill the leaders of Hamas and any militants involved in the Oct. 7 attacks.
- A special unit inside Israel's domestic intelligence service, the Shin Bet, was formed to do exactly that.
- U.S. intelligence services and special operation units worked with the Israelis for months to hunt down Sinwar and his deputies, investing a huge amount of intelligence and operational resources.
- Time and time again, the forces got close to Sinwar inside the Hamas tunnels in southern Gaza — but time and time again, he managed to evade them.
When Sinwar was finally caught, it was pure coincidence.
- The Israel Defense Forces unit that closed in on the house he was hiding in didn't know the identity of the militants with whom they were exchanging fire.
- The 19-year-old soldier who killed the most wanted man in the Middle East only discovered his historic accomplishment in hindsight.
Flashback: As the fighting with Hezbollah on the northern border escalated in the days after Oct. 7, Israel also started targeting senior commanders of the Iranian-backed Shia militia.
- Israel took out several Hamas and Hezbollah commanders in the first six months of the war. But a major breakthrough came in mid-July with the killing of the commander of Hamas' military wing, Mohammed Deif, in an airstrike in southern Gaza.
- It was the first time Israel had managed to kill one of the architects of the Oct. 7 attacks.
Two weeks later, Israel conducted an airstrike in Beirut and killed Hezbollah's top military commander, Fuad Shukr — the biggest blow to the militia since Israel's assassination of its previous military commander, Imad Mughniyeh, in 2008.
- Another Israeli assassination was carried out less than a day later — this time in Tehran, where a bomb exploded in an Iranian government guesthouse and killed Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh.
- In mid-September, Israel launched an unprecedented clandestine attack against Hezbollah — remotely detonating thousands of pagers and walkie-talkies.
- The explosions left thousands of Hezbollah members killed or wounded, among them several senior officials.
Over the next few days, Israel carried out a series of unprecedented airstrikes that destroyed large parts of Hezbollah's rocket and missile arsenals and killed many of its senior and mid-level commanders, including its head of military operations, Ibrahim Aki, and a dozen of the elite Radwan Force's top commanders.
Zoom in: The attacks reached their height in late September with the assassination of Hezbollah's leader Hassan Nasrallah in his bunker with many of his senior deputies.
- Among those killed were Hezbollah's southern front commander, Ali Karaki, and the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps commander in Lebanon, Brigadier Gen. Abbas Nilforoushan.
- It took less than a week for the IDF to assassinate Nasrallah's successor, Hashim Safi al-Din, in an airstrike on Hezbollah's intelligence headquarters.
- The militia's head of intelligence, Hussein Hazimah, known as "Mortada," was also in that bunker. Neither of their bodies has been found to this day.
The big picture: The series of assassinations and other military operations in the region helped restore much of Israel's deterrence, which was shattered on Oct. 7.
- Israeli officials say most of Hamas' and Hezbollah's military leadership has been eliminated, and much of the political leadership is dead or on the run.
- Still, while the decapitations have made it far more difficult for Hamas and Hezbollah to function, the groups are far from destroyed or willing to surrender.
Between the lines: Despite the elimination of the leaders of Hamas and Hezbollah, Israel is still looking for an exit strategy from the wars it's fighting.
- Such a strategy will have to include a deal for the release of the hostages, a plan for post-Hamas governance in Gaza, and a diplomatic agreement in Lebanon that allows for the return of displaced civilians on both sides of the border.
- All of those seem elusive.
What's next: "The challenge going forward is to turn tactical wins in battle into a strategy that secures Israel's people and its future," White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said in his speech at the Oct. 7 memorial ceremony at the Israeli embassy two weeks ago.
- Sullivan stressed that doing that takes "discipline, courage and foresight" to match the conduct of war to clear strategic objectives.
- "That is never easy, but it's imperative, and we are here to work with you on that," he added.
