After the Israeli assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas has appointed the more hardline Yahya Sinwar as its new head. He was decided upon by Hamas’s 50-strong Shura Council, a consultative body composed of officials elected by Hamas members in four chapters: Gaza, the West Bank, the diaspora, and security prisoners in Israeli jails.
Sinwar has been the most obstructive amongst Hamas’s leaders regarding a possible ceasefire, On Israel’s Channel 12, as reported by the Times of Israel, Palestinian affairs analyst Ohad Hemo noted that Sinwar “is now the most powerful figure in Hamas, formally too. That was already essentially the case, now it’s official…. It’s a show of faith” by Hamas, “whose leadership is rapidly shrinking, and it returns the formal center of Hamas power to Gaza.”
