IDF claims Mohammed Sinwar’s remains recovered from Gaza tunnel

The Israeli military has claimed to have recovered the body of senior Hamas figure Mohammed Sinwar from a tunnel located beneath the European Hospital in southern Gaza.

The announcement was made by the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) on Sunday, following the reported identification of the recovered remains.

Mohammed Sinwar was the younger brother of Yahya Sinwar, the former leader of Hamas in Gaza, who was reportedly killed by Israeli forces in October 2024.

The younger Sinwar was believed to have died in a recent wave of targeted assassinations by Israel, which have dealt heavy blows to Hamas’s senior leadership. However, these strikes have yet to weaken the group’s grip on power within the enclave.

Read: Hamas Gaza Commander Mohammed Sinwar eliminated, says Israeli PM

The area around the European Hospital in Khan Younis was hit by a major Israeli airstrike on May 13, just one day after Hamas released Israeli-American soldier Edan Alexander.

Following the strike, the IDF confirmed that it had targeted what it described as a “Hamas command and control centre” located within underground infrastructure at the hospital site.

After weeks of speculation, Israeli authorities announced that Mohammed Sinwar had been killed in that strike.

In a public statement, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had declared “We changed the face of the Middle East. We pushed the terrorists from our territories. We entered the Gaza Strip with force. We eliminated tens of thousands of terrorists. We eliminated Mohammad Deif, Ismail Haniyeh, Yahya Sinwar, and Mohammed Sinwar.”