Who is Mohammed Deif, the Hamas military chief targeted by Israel?

By Sophie Tanno, CNN

(CNN) — Israel has targeted Hamas’ military chief Mohammed Deif in a strike on a designated humanitarian zone in southern Gaza which killed at least 90 Palestinians. It is not clear yet if Deif was among the dead. But who is he?

An elusive and powerful figure, Deif is understood to be one of the masterminds behind the October 7 attacks. He has led the Palestinian militant group’s armed wing for more than two decades.

If his death is confirmed, Deif would be the highest profile Hamas leader killed since the war in Gaza began nine months ago. Israel has been seeking to dismantle Hamas following the October 7 attacks but with fighting ongoing and senior Hamas figures at large, that goal has seemed distant.

Deif is thought to have been born in the 1960s in the Khan Younis refugee camp, one of a number of such camps established in Gaza at the end of the 1940s for displaced Palestinians denied the freedom to return to their homes by the newly-created state of Israel.

Born as Mohammad Diab Ibrahim al-Masri, he later became known as “El Deif” or “the Guest” due to his habit of staying in different houses every night for decades to avoid being tracked and killed by Israel.

Deif has been at the top of Israel’s most wanted list for decades, with Israel holding him responsible for the deaths of dozens of its citizens. Both the US and the EU have him on terror blacklists.

He joined Hamas during the first Intifada, or Palestinian uprising, which began in 1987. He became a founding member of Hamas’ armed wing, the Qassam Brigades, in the early 1990s. The military unit was established to support Hamas in its armed resistance against Israel and has since carried out numerous attacks, including suicide bombings.

From the beginning, Deif has been a key architect in Hamas’s strategy against Israel. He was behind a wave of suicide attacks in 1996 that killed 65 people in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, as well as other acts intended to derail the Israel-Palestine peace process.

Deif rose through the ranks of the Qassam Brigades to be named its leader in 2002, after the previous commander was killed by Israel.

Considered a highly-skilled bomb maker, he has played a significant role in developing Hamas’s network of tunnels and bomb-making expertise.

Over the years, Deif has survived numerous assassination attempts – a total of seven, according to Reuters. This includes a 2014 Israeli strike that killed his wife, his seven-month-old son and three-year-old daughter.

He was seriously injured in one of the assassination attempts, sustaining serious leg injuries and losing an eye.

Deif is understood to have played a role in orchestrating Hamas’s brutal cross-border raids on October 7, which saw around 1,200 Israelis killed. Israel’s campaign in Gaza has since killed more than 38,000 people.

Soon after the attacks, he called for a general uprising. “If you have a gun, get it out. This is the time to use it – get out with trucks, cars, axes, today the best and most honorable history starts,” he said in a recorded message.

In May, the International Criminal Court (ICC) said it was seeking arrest warrants for Deif, as well as Yehiya Sinwar, Hamas’s leader in Gaza, and Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’s political bureau head, saying they had “reasonable grounds” to believe they bore responsibility for the October 7 attacks.

Deif, a man who lives his life in the shadows, has managed to survive for decades while running Hamas’s armed wing. This achievement has earned him the nickname “the Cat with Nine Lives.” It remains to be seen, however, whether Deif has survived this latest attempt on his life.

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