Israel Targets Senior Hamas Commander, Raed Saad
The Israeli army announced yesterday evening the assassination
of Raed Saad, a senior commander in Hamas’s military wing, the al‑Qassam Brigades, in an airstrike that
targeted his vehicle while driving along al‑Rashid coastal road west of Gaza
City on Saturday. The strike killed seven Palestinians and wounded many others,
some critically.
Hamas confirmed Saad’s death, denouncing the strike as a “criminal breach of
the ceasefire” and accusing Israel of systematically undermining the truce.
The movement called on mediators, particularly the United States, to pressure
Israel into respecting the agreement and halting what it described as ongoing
violations.
A Name That Never Leaves Israel’s Target Bank
Saad was among the highest‑ranking leaders in the al‑Qassam
Brigades’ General Staff and a member of its Military Council—the movement’s
supreme military body. Over more than 35 years, he rose through advanced
organizational and military positions, making him one of the most prominent
figures on Israel’s assassination list.
Birth and Early Life
Raed Saad was born in 1972 in al‑Shati refugee camp northwest
of Gaza City. His family hailed from the village of
Hamama near Ashkelon, from which they were displaced during the 1948 Nakba.
He began his militant path early, joining the founding leaders
of Hamas’s military apparatus. As a result, he was arrested multiple times by
Israeli forces, spending a total of 14 months in prison. One of the charges
against him was his close association with Hamas’s founder, Sheikh Ahmad
Yassin.
In 1996, during the Palestinian Authority’s security campaign
against Hamas, Saad was detained by Preventive Security and General
Intelligence for four years before being released with the outbreak of the al‑Aqsa
Intifada in September 2000.
After his release, he pursued academic studies at the Islamic
University of Gaza, earning a doctorate in Islamic jurisprudence.
Military Beginnings
Saad was among the first to establish al‑Aqsa Intifada cells
and one of seven men who formed the al‑Qassam Brigades’ military apparatus.
Alongside martyrs Faraj al‑Ghoul, Saad al‑Arabid, Khalil Abu Salmiya, and
Suhail Abu Nahl, he helped lay the nucleus of the Brigades in northern al‑Shati.
In September 2005, a year after Israel’s withdrawal from Gaza,
the al‑Qassam Brigades issued a paper outlining their strategy and leadership.
Raed Saad was listed as commander of Gaza City Brigade.
He later held several senior posts: the first commander of
Gaza City Brigade, head of operations, head of manufacturing, and most recently
deputy commander‑in‑chief of the Brigades.
A Long History of Assassination Attempts
After the Battleof al‑Furqan (2008–2009), Israeli intelligence accused Saad of
establishing a military academy for the Brigades.
Following Israel’s 2012 assault on Gaza, which saw the first
rocket strike on Tel Aviv, Saad appeared at a mass rally in Gaza City,
declaring: “The Brigades’ offensive capabilities have not been weakened;
they are today far stronger than the occupation’s intelligence imagines.”
During the Battle of al‑Asf al‑Makoul
(2014), Israel claimed Saad was behind the creation of the naval commando unit
that carried out the Zikim base raid.
After the Battle of Sword of Jerusalem in May 2021, Saad survived an assassination
attempt, though his home in al‑Shati camp was later bombed.
During the al‑Aqsa Flood operation, Saad was on Israel’s most‑wanted list, with a bounty
of $800,000 offered for information on his whereabouts.
In January 2024, Israel claimed to have captured him inside al‑Shifa
Hospital during its second raid, but the allegation was later proven false.
On June 22, 2024, al‑Shati camp was heavily bombed, collapsing
an entire residential block. Israeli outlets claimed Saad was the target, but
he survived.
“Jericho Wall”
According to a report in Yedioth Ahronoth, Israel’s
security establishment obtained multiple versions of a plan authored and
overseen by Raed Saad between 2016 and 2022. Known as the “Jericho Wall”, the 39‑page document detailed a
strategy for elite al‑Qassam fighters to storm settlements around Gaza and
dismantle Israel’s Gaza Division.
The plan included precise instructions on infiltration,
dispersing Israeli forces, killing and capturing large numbers of soldiers, and
transferring them into Gaza.
In sum: Raed Saad’s life was marked by
decades of leadership within Hamas’s military wing, repeated assassination
attempts, and his central role in shaping strategies that kept him permanently
on Israel’s target list—until his killing in December 2025.
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