First admission: Hamas confirms death of military chief Mohammed Deif - report

Hamas sources admitted to the death of Mohammed Deif, the former head of the Izzadin al-Qassam Brigades, the terror organization’s military wing, months after Israel confirmed his elimination, Arabic newspaper Asharq Al-Awsat reported last Friday.

The report from the Arabic source stated that the “terrorist organization’s leadership inside and outside the Gaza Strip received new indications confirming Deif’s assassination.”

The IDF announced back in July of this year that they eliminated Deif in a strike in the Al-Mawasi area near Khan Yunis, but Hamas denied that he was killed.

Sources told Asharq Al-Awsat that officials surrounding Deif confirmed that, after communication between them and Hamas’s leadership was restored, contact with Deif had been lost since the Israeli operation that targeted him.

Sources said that the officials surrounding Deif conveyed a written message confirming that contact with him had been lost and that a few days after the July 13 attack on him, half of a person’s body was found at the target’s location – which Asharq Al-Awsat report claims was likely to be Deif.

His supposed body was kept for many hours, and samples were taken from it before it was allowed to be buried in one of the cemeteries in Khan Yunis, according to the newspaper.

The samples confirmed to those responsible for Deif’s security that half the body belonged to him, Hamas sources indicated to the Arab news source. Doubts were nevertheless raised among some of those close to him and his family that he had truly been assassinated.

However, with the long period of his absence and the loss of communication with him, it became certain to al-Qassam Brigade leaders that he had indeed been killed, the report added.

Hamas sources explained to Asharq Al-Awsat that the delay in announcing the confirmation of Deif’s death to other leaders of Hamas was due to the difficulty of communication among them amid the current war.

Hamas investigated suspects who allegedly leaked Deif's location to Israel 

Two people, whom the report referred to as “mail messengers,” were also investigated by Hamas, sources added.

The first, a Rafah resident, conveyed messages between the al-Qassam Brigades leaders and is under suspicion of collaborating with Israel and leaking Deif’s location to it.

He was reportedly accompanied by the second suspect, who was responsible for conveying messages directly to Rafa Salama, the head of the Khan Yunis branch of the al-Qassam Brigades, who was killed alongside Deif in July.

Hours after the July attack that killed both of them, sources confirmed Salama’s death to Asharq Al-Awsat, noting that he had been buried in a cemetery in the city by some of his relatives and Hamas terrorists.