Last Saturday morning, the IDF carried out a particularly strong and daring attack in the Khan Yunis refugee camp, in an area defined as a “humanitarian zone” until now; the attack included the dropping of 7 powerful aerial bombs on a small palm-encircled compound, leading to its total destruction. Soon, the goals of the operation – the commander of Hamas’s Khan Yunis brigade, Rafe Salameh, and the commander of Hamas’ military wing (the al-Qassam Brigades) – were revealed. Now, two days after the attack, a few details were published explaining how the IDF, for the first time in the war, managed to track down Deif, which is considered one of the most important targets in the Gaza Strip.
According to security sources, this was an aggregate process of three insights: 1. Understanding the location of Salameh, in a small compound in the refugee camp. 2. The understanding that Deif changes places frequently both because of their fear of Israel and for health reasons, which may force it to occasionally ascend from the underground. 3. Understanding the special relationship between Deif and Salameh, and the high chance that Deif would seek asylum with his friend. According to IDF sources, Salameh’s location was discovered already many weeks ago, but the IDF waited patiently for Deif to join the site. On Saturday night, there was an intelligence indication of Daf’s presence, which led to an attack the next morning; at the same time, special intelligence research proved that there is no fear of Israeli hostages in the compound together with the senior officials.
Until now, the IDF has issued an official statement regarding Salameh’s death, but is waiting for more certainty before he formally determines Deif’s fate. This is due to a bitter past experience of Israel, which has tried to eliminate Deif more than 7 times in the past, but has only led to his severe injury. Among the assassination attempts are Operation ‘Anemone Picking’ in September 2003, in which Israel failed due to the use of too small of an explosive device (if half the amount of the explosives used in this attack had been used back then, Deif would have been killed then with certainty, along with many other senior figures); An assassination attempt was carried out exactly 18 years ago, in July 2006, the morning before the outbreak of the Second Lebanon War; and a recent attempt in the framework of Operation Defensive Shield, from which Dief slipped in the last moment. The great survival rate of Deif has made him an icon and myth among the Palestinian population, which will only increase the moral harm and Israeli success if and when the death of Deif is revealed.
