Key targets in Israel’s operation embrace performing chief Khalil al-Hayya, former head Khaled Mashaal, and finance chief Zaher Jabarin.
Israel on Tuesday carried out a focused airstrike in Doha, Qatar, in an try to assassinate a number of prime members of the Hamas management.
Key targets on this operation have been Khalil al-Hayya, Khaled Mashaal, and Zaher Jabarin, whose fates are all unknown on the time of writing.
However who’re these three folks and what roles have they got in Hamas?
Right here is every part you’ll want to know.
Blasts heard in Doha, Qatar, September 9, 2025. (credit score: Screenshot/Telegram, By way of part 27a of copyright act)
Who’s Khalil al-Hayya?
Khalil al-Hayya is the performing chief of Hamas, having been a part of the quinquevirate (five-member) management that made up Hamas’s uppermost echelons within the wake of the assassination of Yahya Sinwar in October 2024.
Born in Gaza, Hayya has been a member of Hamas for many years and was a longtime shut ally of Sinwar. This shut relationship reportedly led him to behave as Sinwar’s fundamental consultant to the Hamas politburo abroad, which some sources attributed to Sinwar’s frosty relationship with the terrorist group’s senior figures in exile.
This place additionally allowed Hayya to foster sturdy ties with a few of Hamas’s allies, comparable to Iran.
In 2022, he led a Hamas delegation to Damascus to fix ties with former Syrian president Bashar al-Assad, which have been damaged a decade earlier when the motion endorsed the largely Sunni rebellion in opposition to Assad, a member of the minority Alawite sect.
Hayya has been very vocal about his assist of the October 7 bloodbath, saying that the assault succeeded in bringing the Palestinian challenge again into worldwide focus. Nonetheless, he has additionally stated it was meant to be a restricted operation to seize “numerous troopers” to swap for jailed Palestinians.
“However the Zionist military unit fully collapsed,” he stated in feedback printed by the Hamas-linked Palestinian Data Middle, referring to the IDF.
He additional climbed the ranks of the group in 2024 following the IDF assassination of senior Hamas official Saleh al-Arouri.
In December 2024, Hayya additionally reportedly took over management of the Izzadin al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas.
However essentially the most public and notable position Hayya has performed in Hamas is because the terrorist group’s chief negotiator, being the first determine attending the various hostage deal and ceasefire negotiations.
All through his time in Hamas, Hayya has survived quite a few assassination makes an attempt in opposition to him, a few of which reportedly resulted within the deaths of lots of his family members.
FORMER HAMAS HEAD Khaled Mashaal speaks throughout an interview in Doha, Qatar, final 12 months. ‘The enemy solely understands the language of jihad and martyrdom,’ he says. (credit score: IBRAHEEM ABU MUSTAFA/REUTERS)
Who’s Khaled Mashaal?
Khaled Mashaal is a longtime pillar of Hamas and had served because the group’s chief for many years, with him being changed by Ismail Haniyeh in 2017.
Regardless of not being Hamas’s chief, Mashaal has retained a excessive profile within the group and has stepped in as performing chief on a couple of event over the course of the Israel-Hamas Warfare.
Regardless of having served in Hamas for therefore lengthy, Mashaal has not lived in Palestinian territory since earlier than the group was based – aside from just a few temporary visits, with the Mashaal household having fled the nation following the Six Day Warfare.
When Hamas was established in 1987, Mashaal led the group’s actions in Kuwait and took a seat on the Hamas politburo when it was based within the Nineteen Nineties, quickly turning into its chairman.
When Hamas founder Ahmed Yassin was killed by Israel in 2004, Mashaal was acknowledged because the true chief of the group. Underneath his management, Hamas gained widespread reputation, beating Fatah and profitable a majority within the 2006 Palestinian elections.
Mashaal additionally performed a significant position in negotiating the prisoner swap deal that noticed the discharge of captured IDF soldier Gilad Schalit in 2012.
Quite a few assassination makes an attempt have additionally been made in opposition to Mashaal through the years, together with a really high-profile Mossad poisoning try in 1997, which sparked a diplomatic disaster with Jordan.
Even after his retirement in 2017, Mashaal retained an necessary position within the group. Following the killing of Sinwar, he was one of many Hamas officers to hitch the quinquevirate management to assist lead the group.
Who’s Zaher Jabarin?
Zaher Jabarin is the longtime chief of the Hamas Monetary Bureau and was answerable for managing the intricate monetary community and funding portfolio. On this capability, he was the person who made positive the cash flowed, retaining the terrorist group working and pumping it in for his or her varied operations.
Within the late Eighties, throughout Hamas’s early years, Jabarin co-founded the group’s West Financial institution navy forces. On this capability, he was thought-about answerable for the various killings of IDF troopers and police throughout the First Intifada.
Arrested by Israeli forces in 1993 and sentenced to life in jail, Jabarin was freed in 2011 throughout the Gilad Schalit prisoner swap deal. After this, he left the nation, setting himself up in Instanbul to handle the Monetary Bureau, in addition to the Workplace of Martyrs, Wounded, and Prisoners.
Jabarin was profitable in his managing of the Hamas funds, rising the group’s funds to the issue of a whole lot of thousands and thousands of {dollars}. This included diversified investments, comparable to actual property and shares, to non-public donations and fundraising operations. By 2024, Hamas’s investments have been valued at over half a billion {dollars}, in keeping with NBC Information. Moreover, in keeping with the US Workplace of International Belongings Management, he additionally helped improve the circulate of funds to Hamas from Iran.
However Jabarin took on new tasks in early 2024 after the demise of Arouri, main the Hamas finance chief to change into the brand new chief of the group’s West Financial institution operations.
This led to an uptick in terrorist assaults within the West Financial institution and components of Israel, at a time when Hamas’s capabilities in Gaza have been strained underneath strain by the IDF.
As well as, Jabarin’s management of the Workplace of Martyrs, Wounded, and Prisoners noticed him play a job within the negotiations with Israel over the hostages.
Reuters contributed to this report
