By Wesam Bahrani
It is a stinging setback for Netanyahu and his fascist war cabinet that Yahya Sinwar, who is believed to have masterminded Operation Al-Aqsa Storm on October 7, is now chief of staff, more powerful than ever before.
If Tel Aviv and Washington thought that by assassinating Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas would lose power or influence, they have both, for the umpteenth time, completely miscalculated the nature of the resistance facing them.
Sinwar, who spent the majority of his adult life—23 years—in Israeli dungeons and speaks fluent Hebrew, will now be pulling all the strings as far as the struggle for the liberation of occupied territories is concerned.
After more than 300 days of waging a genocidal war on Gaza, reducing the entire territory to rubble, invading the same areas, and declaring victory over Hamas, only to invade them again, it is already a testimony to the Israeli military's inability to defeat the Palestinian resistance.
Add all the war crimes that the Israeli occupation forces have committed in the tiny and totally blockaded Palestinian territory, and yet Hamas can still sit down and convene for two days to appoint Sinwar as Haniyeh's successor.
That is a damning assessment of how Americans and Israelis have lost the plot in this war, despite killing nearly 40,000 people, as if October 7 wasn't bad enough.
The irony is that as the political bureau chief of Hamas, Haniyeh didn't even make the final decisions at the negotiating table with the enemy.
All messages had to go back to Sinwar and Gaza first before any positions were put forward by Hamas, which represents the Axis of Resistance as well. It shows the significance of the battlefield and those leading the fight.
Now try and get a deal with Hamas, whose armed wing, along with other Palestinian resistance factions in Gaza, is going on the offensive against the Israeli occupation forces. Just this week, they engaged the occupation troops just meters away from the separation barrier east of Khan Younis city.
The families of Israeli captives in Gaza can forget about any future prisoner exchange agreement, and the foolhardiness of Netanyahu, who wants to prolong the genocidal war against Palestinians in Gaza.
Sinwar is now the political leader and the overall decision-maker, and he is inside Gaza, not in exile.
He won't agree to any ceasefire deal when he knows fully well that the Israeli occupation forces have been defeated inside the besieged territory, but Tel Aviv or Washington still won't admit it.
If they did, it would not only be the biggest embarrassment of the century but would collapse whatever power of deterrence that the Israelis or the Americans believe they retain in the region.
The Axis of Resistance has been running the show for a while now, and that puts all the Arab puppet regimes to shame as well—those who have covertly or overtly backed the regime or whitewashed its crimes.
The resistance in Gaza will continue. More Israeli troops will be killed in the most sophisticated of ambushes, and the Gaza metro is not only still intact but running overtime. These are the undeniable facts.
Sinwar will wait until Netanyahu waves the white flag himself. The former Palestinian prisoner studied Hebrew to understand the mindset of his enemy and mastered the entire thought process of the Israelis and the Americans when he spent more than 23 years in the most notorious Israeli prisons.
Just like his predecessor Haniyeh, Sinwar sacrificed everything he had for the sake of Palestinian statehood, freedom, dignity, and national identity.
He tried the peaceful way with the March of Return rallies. It didn't work out after Israeli snipers used peaceful Gazan protesters as target practice.
Sinwar went straight down the path of armed resistance after one year of planning and shocked the world with Operation Al-Aqsa Storm. It marked a watershed moment and the beginning of the end of the apartheid, child-murdering, illegitimate regime.
There is nothing left of Gaza. Israelis can't continue bombing what has already been bombed multiple times over the past ten months.
Too many Palestinians have suffered. And Sinwar has seen it all now. He won't lay down the arms of Hamas or any other Palestinian resistance movement. They cannot afford to retreat or surrender at this moment and after so many sacrifices, including that of Haniyeh.
This is where the Americans and the Israelis got it all wrong with Haniyeh's assassination. Haniyeh had already lost more than 60 of his family members and relatives over the past ten months but never once dropped the flag of Palestine. He continued to be the flagbearer of the Palestinian resistance.
Not even when his sons, grandchildren, and sister were martyred. He vowed to continue until his last hour. He vowed not to compromise on his principles.
If anything, Sinwar is even more determined. He has been in Gaza and has seen it all. He is a witness to Israeli barbarity and has buried his comrades himself.
Palestinians, and in particular those in Gaza, take pride in martyrdom. It's a badge of honor for them. Israeli occupation forces don't. They lack the cause. They know they stand on the wrong side of history.
Al-Qassam Brigades and all other armed resistance factions in Gaza crave martyrdom for the cause of Palestine, its freedom, and dignity, and they are all answering the call of Sinwar now.
Sinwar won't surrender. He will fight until victory or martyrdom—no more humiliation in Gaza. The equation changed many months ago, and it changed forever.
Haniyeh, Sinwar, and more than two million Gazans have put Palestine back on the map of the world at a time when the Palestinian cause was virtually put on the backburner and normalization with the occupying Zionist entity was trending in the Arab world.
It has been reported that the newly-appointed Hamas political bureau chief follows the school of the battle of Karbala. And 1,400 years on, Karbala is the shining light that glows over the Axis of Resistance in its battle against barbarism, injustice, and tyranny.
The oppressed people of Gaza, who have been living in the world's largest open-air prison for decades, are on the path to victory or martyrdom.
Sinwar's appointment augurs well for Hamas in particular and the Palestinian resistance in general. It could be a precursor for the liberation of occupied territories and the annihilation of the apartheid regime.
Wesam Bahrani is an Iraqi journalist and commentator.
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