“The Hamas leadership abroad is looking for a replacement for its leader in the Gaza Strip, Yahya Sinwar, as the group's battalions in Khan Younis have been disbanded and an offensive in Rafah is looming,” Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant said, according to The Times of Israel “. “Hamas does not trust its commanders, that is very, very clear,” said Gallant after an analysis of the situation with the head of the IDF Southern Command, Major General Yaron Finkelman. “Hamas in Gaza is unresponsive and there is no one to talk to as a local leader,” the minister claims, adding that the Hamas leadership is looking abroad for new leaders in Gaza.
In Khan Younis, Gallant said about 200 suspected terrorists had surrendered to troops at Nasser Hospital and dozens at Al-Amal Hospital, indicating Hamas's loss of “fighting spirit.” “The people who had RPGs, guns and rifles didn’t fight. “That says something about their understanding of the balance of power, that they understood that their fate is to give up or die, there is no third option,” he explains. Gallant says Hamas' Khan Younis Brigade has been “defeated.” He notes that Hamas “has remained with marginal forces in the central camps and with the Rafah Brigade, and what stands between them and complete collapse as a military system is an IDF decision,” he explains. “There is no one here to help them, no Iranians, no international help,” Gallant says, promising that the IDF will disband the remaining six Hamas battalions, two in the central Gaza Strip and four in Rafah. “We have no right to stop while Hamas is holding 134 hostages,” the minister added.