Theme: Hamas

Former Israeli military chief Herzi Halevi said in New York on Sunday that the October 7, 2023 attack was a failure that could have been prevented, but that there was “absolutely no internal betrayal”, according to The Times of Israel.

Israel’s defense establishment is implementing an unprecedented policy in the Gaza Strip that grants immunity to mayors and senior officials in Hamas’s governmental and municipal systems, according to the Jerusalem Post. Military sources told Walla that the decision not to target the heads of local Hamas authorities stems from concern that killing them could lead to the collapse of governing institutions in Gaza and to civilian chaos that Israel would ultimately have to deal with, the paper reported.

Israeli opposition leader Gadi Eisenkot has set out four conditions for forming a new government, including recognizing Hamas as a “terrorist” organization and committing to dismantling its military and governing capabilities in Gaza, according to Middle East Eye.

The Israeli military said in a statement on Friday that it killed two Hamas commanders in an airstrike on the Nuseirat area in the central Gaza Strip the previous day. One of the commanders was identified as Ihab Jamil Abu Taqiya, a squad commander in Hamas’ military wing, who, according to the statement, was involved in holding Israeli hostages at the beginning of the war. Xinhua reported.

The Israeli military has carried out a new series of strikes on the Gaza Strip and says they killed four members of Hamas and Islamic Jihad, according to the army press service, as cited by TASS.

Hamas leaders in Gaza conveyed to the UN humanitarian coordinator in the Strip, Ramiz Alakbarov, a message that the group is prepared to carry out another attack like the one of October 7, 2023, and asked for it to be delivered to Israel, according to the Times of Israel, which cites Ynet. The message was passed on to the Israeli army’s chief liaison to the Palestinians, Major General Yoram Halevy, who wrote an urgent letter to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz stating that it is an unusual threat, which had never been conveyed with that level of bluntness and directness. The excerpt of the letter was published on Saturday evening by Channel 13, according to the same outlet.

Israel’s military launched an operation in the Hebron area expected to last several days, with systematic searches for infrastructure and weapons and the questioning of dozens of suspects, following Friday morning’s deadly Hamas attack, according to a joint statement from the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and the Shin Bet (Israel Security Agency). According to the Jerusalem Post, the searches focus on the area out of which the attackers operated. Troops from the IDF, the Shin Bet, the Border Police and the Civil Administration are carrying out “targeted and thorough searches… in the area to locate and dismantle terror infrastructure and weapons, and to interrogate many dozens of suspects,” according to the Times of Israel.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said it instructed security forces to immediately cordon off Hebron and prepare a full closure of the West Bank starting Friday, according to the Associated Press (AP). The order came a few hours after an attack near Hebron that injured at least five people, some critically, the agency reported. Netanyahu blamed Hamas, saying the group was “planning a major attack aimed at murdering innocent civilians.”

Senior Israeli military officials presented intelligence to their US counterparts indicating that Hamas has no intention of disarming and is instead rebuilding its forces in the Gaza Strip in preparation for possible renewed fighting, the Haaretz daily reported on Thursday, according to The Times of Israel. According to the report, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) believe Hamas will not hand over its weapons to an international body and could be disarmed only through military operations, including entering areas of Gaza not currently under Israel’s control.

An Israeli attack on an apartment in Gaza killed two people and injured others, according to The Associated Press. The Israeli military says it targeted a Hamas militant.

Former US vice president Kamala Harris criticized the administration of former US president Joe Biden over its response to Israel’s war against Hamas in Gaza during the 2026 Asan Memorial Lecture in Seoul on Wednesday. Harris said the United States needed to uphold its obligation to international law and that the Biden administration’s response was a failure in that regard. She also criticized the current US government, under US President Donald Trump, saying it “offers Netanyahu a blank check.”

US officials and representatives of the Board of Peace are preparing a field survey and mapping operation in Gaza to identify locations where Hamas members would hand over weapons under Trump's 20-point plan, according to Walla, in text republished by The Jerusalem Post. Israel approved the entry into Gaza of an American company, under the Board of Peace, to identify Hamas arms handover sites, according to the public broadcaster Kan, in text republished by The Times of Israel.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said it struck three Hamas weapons storage facilities, a command center and a missile launch site in the Gaza Strip, according to TASS. The IDF said advance warnings were issued to the population and precision munitions and aerial surveillance were used, according to the same source.

Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas postponed legislative elections due next month until September 11, 2027 on Saturday and called a presidential poll for the same date, according to Reuters, in a text republished by The Jerusalem Post. France called on the Palestinian authorities to reverse their decision and to organize parliamentary and presidential elections throughout Palestine as soon as possible, according to the same report. Hamas endorsed Abbas's decision to postpone the Palestinian Legislative Council elections, originally scheduled for November 28, until September 11, 2027, according to The Jerusalem Post.

A senior Israeli security official told Walla that Hamas is showing signs of preparing for attacks against Israeli forces, according to the Jerusalem Post. Israeli intelligence had identified indications that Hamas was planning to confront IDF troops along the Yellow Line, according to the same official. Asked about the possibility of a large-scale confrontation before Israel's October 27 elections, the official assessed the likelihood as low.

International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) President Mirjana Spoljaric said she met former Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Qatar on two separate occasions to arrange a visit to Israeli hostages held in Gaza, according to The Jerusalem Post. Spoljaric said the ICRC had no access to the hostages.

Neomi Neumann, former head of the Shin Bet research headquarters, told KAN News that Hamas still controls Gaza, according to the Jerusalem Post. She said Hamas generates between 2 and 5 million US dollars daily through heavy taxes on goods in the Gaza Strip, and that it “boycotts some of the humanitarian aid and sells the products at high prices on the black market”.

Jared Kushner marked one year since an agreement was reached on Trump's 20-point plan for Gaza, saying significant progress had been made in implementing it over the past year, according to the Jerusalem Post. Among the milestones he cited were the return of the 20 living hostages to Israel in October 2025, the return of the remains of the final hostage in January 2026 and the formation of a technocratic Palestinian administration for Gaza. Kushner said humanitarian aid to Gaza has increased significantly since the ceasefire and that Hamas signed in July a phased disarmament framework that has not been fully implemented.

The Israeli military announced it had killed Muhammad Muhsen Nimr Yazji, a commander of Hamas’s Shati Battalion, in strikes in Gaza City on Monday, according to the Jerusalem Post. The announcement was made on Thursday evening. Yazji held Emily Damari, Romi Gonen and Matan Angrest as hostages, according to the military. In separate strikes on Tuesday, the military said it killed Muhammad Fawzi Muhammad Awad Gamal, of Hamas’s Daraj Tuffah Battalion.

Israel marks on Wednesday the third anniversary of the October 7, 2023 attack by Hamas, weeks before a general election and after a ceasefire in Gaza last year, according to France24. The attack killed 1,221 people, according to an Agence France-Presse (AFP) tally based on official Israeli figures. Israel’s military offensive in response left most of Gaza in ruins and killed more than 74,200 people, according to Gaza’s health ministry. Since the ceasefire, Israeli forces have killed more than 1,430 people in Gaza, according to the territory’s health ministry.

Israel’s defence ministry said that 1,318 Israeli personnel have been killed since Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack, whether in the line of duty or as a result of an accident, illness, or suicide, according to the Middle East Eye.

Israel said on Saturday it attempted to kill Hamas’s top leader in the Gaza Strip, Ali al-Amoudi, in an airstrike on an apartment. Local officials say the strike killed five people, and an official at Gaza City’s Al-Shifa hospital told AFP it received at dawn the bodies of five people and a number of injured in the Rimal neighbourhood. The Israeli military said it aimed to kill al-Amoudi, describing him as the right-hand man of slain Hamas chief Yahya Sinwar and saying he was involved in planning the October 7 attack.

The Trump administration unveiled sanctions against three individuals allegedly related to the Islamist militant group Hamas and against two charities based in France, according to The Guardian. Investigators alleged that the network moved more than $2m to Hamas “through deceptive charitable fronts and cryptocurrency channels”. All property in the US of those sanctioned is blocked and must be reported to the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC).

The Israel Defense Forces said that 170 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip who were identified as journalists after their deaths were members of armed groups, according to The Times of Israel. According to the military, 118 were active in Hamas's military wing and 49 operated in Islamic Jihad, two were members of the Popular Resistance Committees and one was in the Mujahideen Brigades.

Israel’s army killed Izz al-Din al-Beik, head of the Hamas armed wing in the northern Gaza Strip, according to Al Jazeera, citing Palestinian sources and Israeli officials. Al-Beik was killed in a strike on an apartment building in Gaza City’s Nassr neighbourhood early on Tuesday, according to medics and Hamas sources. Local sources identified the two Palestinians killed in the strike as al-Beik and Muhannad Abu Foul, and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz claimed al-Beik was a commander, according to Anadolu (AA).

During a meeting in Abu Dhabi on Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu asked United Arab Emirates President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan to refute a report that he had warned Israel of an impending Hamas attack, according to Middle East Eye. The report, in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, said the Emirati leader had warned Netanyahu days before the Hamas-led attack. The UAE Foreign Ministry declined to comment on the latest report and said it maintains “open and direct lines of communication” with Israel and shares “all relevant intelligence”.

Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir released a video in which he threatens to kill detained Hamas figure Hassan Salameh, according to Al Jazeera.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is preparing a potential case at the International Criminal Court (ICC) against Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, seeking to use it as leverage in their escalating dispute, according to i24NEWS, cited by RT. According to RT, Netanyahu reportedly instructed an Israeli interministerial team and the head of Israel’s International Law Department to prepare a dossier focused primarily on alleged attacks against Kurdish minorities, along with accusations that Erdogan’s government finances Hamas. The move would follow Türkiye’s request last month for an Interpol Red Notice for Netanyahu, after a Turkish court issued an arrest warrant on charges including genocide over Israel’s interception of the Gaza-bound Global Sumud Flotilla earlier this year.

Israel’s former defence minister Yoav Gallant said Hamas had reportedly sent a warning to Israel before its October 7, 2023, attack, with the message conveyed through a Shin Bet channel, according to the Times of India. Also according to Gallant, the warning came from Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, who cautioned that he would “shake the prisons”. Gallant told Army Radio that he first heard about these warnings from media reports, as quoted by The Jerusalem Post.

Hamas leader Khalil al-Hayya told Qatari station Al-Araby that the Israeli election will not change anything for the Palestinians and that “our people have suffered at the hands of all Israeli parties”, according to Agence France-Presse (AFP), in a text republished by the South China Morning Post. He said Hamas refuses to allow the blood, suffering and cause of the Palestinian people to serve as fuel for Israeli elections. The election in Israel is set for October 27.

Hamas condemned the Board of Peace’s decision not to work with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees (UNRWA) and its statement that the agency will have no role in Gaza. In a post on X, the Board said it will only work with trusted partners who will deliver for the people of Gaza and contribute to a deradicalized Strip, and that UNRWA fails on those litmus tests. The Associated Press reported on Friday that Board members had been more willing to work with UNRWA behind the scenes than their public stance suggested.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office called ‘grotesque absurdity’ French President Emmanuel Macron’s claim at the UN General Assembly that Hamas has never operated in the West Bank, according to Agence France-Presse, carried by Channel NewsAsia. The Israeli statement said Hamas militants attack Jews in Judea and Samaria, the Israeli name for the West Bank, ‘almost every day’ and that ‘ignorance is no excuse for erasing their blood’. The Jerusalem Post reports that Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich accused Macron of lying and cited the killing of a French-Israeli father of six in an attack attributed to Hamas in the West Bank on Sunday, September 20, 2026, two days before the speech. Macron spoke in French, and published renderings of his remark vary between ‘never operated’ and ‘never caused trouble’ in the West Bank; he criticised daily violations in the territory and called the humanitarian situation in Gaza ‘a spectacle that shames us all’.

An Israeli air strike hit al-Khiam, in southern Lebanon, overnight into Wednesday, 23 September 2026, damaging transmission lines and cutting power to the entire Nabaa el-Hamas area, according to Lebanon’s National News Agency (NNA), cited by Middle East Eye. A large explosion in al-Khiam, in the Nabatieh governorate, was felt across southern Lebanon, the agency reported. On Tuesday, 22 September, Israeli artillery struck the towns of Al-Mansouri and Baraachit, and Israeli forces advanced on Al-Mansouri with military vehicles and bulldozers, detonating houses in the town’s Fourth Neighbourhood that had been rigged with explosives, according to NNA.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office on Tuesday, 22 September 2026, criticised French President Emmanuel Macron’s claim at the United Nations General Assembly that Hamas has never operated in the West Bank. “The grotesque absurdity of Emmanuel Macron’s statement is staggering,” the statement said, as carried by Middle East Eye and the Jewish News Syndicate (JNS). The statement cites the killing of Netanel Shukrun, a French citizen and father of six, who it says was shot dead in his car by a “Hamas terrorist” on Sunday, 20 September 2026, the eve of Yom Kippur, in the occupied West Bank — the region the Israeli government calls Judea and Samaria. “With his final breath, he told his son to run,” it says. “Hamas terrorists carry out attacks against Jews almost every day. They have murdered countless Israeli civilians in Judea and Samaria.” Macron had called the scenes in Gaza “shameful. A shame for all of us”, and said that “all those who claim that Israel’s security requires violating the sovereignty of all its neighbours are making a fatal mistake”, according to Middle East Eye. Netanyahu is expected to address the UN on Thursday, 24 September 2026.

According to the UN’s official record of the debate and Middle East Eye, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva opened the general debate of the 81st United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) saying that “generations of Palestinians will carry the pain and trauma left by the genocide of women and children perpetrated by Benjamin Netanyahu’s government in Gaza.” In the same speech, on Tuesday, September 22, 2026, Lula said that “Israeli civilians paid the price for the radicalism and intolerance of Hamas’ terrorist acts” and that illegal settlements in the West Bank are making a two-state solution increasingly unviable, according to The New Republic. He criticised the persecution of the International Criminal Court (ICC) and its members and said that the UN special rapporteur for the occupied Palestinian territories, Francesca Albanese, must not be “silenced for telling the truth,” according to Al Jazeera, The New Republic and Israel Hayom.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a video posted on X on Tuesday, September 22, 2026, that he will use his address to the United Nations (UN) General Assembly, scheduled for Thursday, September 24, to defend the country’s soldiers and to “tell the truth” about New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, whom he accused of supporting Hamas and of inciting riots against the city’s Jews, according to The Jerusalem Post and The Times of India. “Shame on you, Mr. Mamdani,” Netanyahu said. “Shame on you for supporting the Hamas terrorist monsters who butchered our people.” The statement answers a CNN interview aired on Monday, September 21, in which Mamdani again called Netanyahu “a war criminal and an architect of a horrific genocide of the Palestinian people” and said the arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) against the prime minister should be honored.

Israel’s defence minister, Israel Katz, said on Tuesday, 22 September 2026, that Gaza City will be evacuated and destroyed if a single Israeli is abducted, and that the military will not make partial withdrawals from the 63% of the territory it holds until Hamas is disarmed. He spoke at the Yom Kippur War memorial in Jerusalem, according to Agence France-Presse, The Jerusalem Post and i24NEWS. “If a single Israeli soldier or civilian is kidnapped, the entire city of Gaza, with its houses and terror towers, will be evacuated southward with its million residents,” Katz said, addressing the warning to Hamas and, explicitly, to the governments of Iran and Turkey. Gaza City’s municipality puts its population at about 1.1 million.