If There Is A Heaven

Sean Bresnahan ✒ Yahya Ibrahim Hassan Al-Sinwar was born in the Khan Yunis Refugee Camp, in the then Egyptian-controlled Gaza Strip, Palestine, on 29th October 1962.

His parents had been forcibly evicted from their homes in the since destroyed city of al-Majdal Asqualan, dispossessed of their land by Zionist forces as they rampaged through Palestine, carrying out what would become known as ‘The Nakba’. Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians endured the same fate — driven at gunpoint to the Gaza Strip as the newly-formed Israeli state cleansed the land of those who had lived on it for centuries. All would remain refugees for the rest of their lives. They would die still holding the keys to their homes.

It was there, in that deeply disturbing environment, where Yahya Al-Sinwar grew to be a man. A man of intelligence and highest principle, it could be no other way than that the desperate conditions endured all around him fostered within an unwavering desire for the freedom of his people — a want for freedom that we here in Ireland know only too well, having too been victim to the scourge of colonialism. We, too, were driven from our homesteads, only to the hills and not to the camps. We, too, were starved to our deaths by a power intent on our destruction as a nation. Like the suffering people of Palestine, we too refused to give up on our dreams.

‘They wanted prison to be a grave for us, a mill to grind our will, determination and bodies. But, thank God, with our belief in our cause we turned the prison into sanctuaries of worship and academies for study’ — Yahya Al-Sinwar

He joined the Resistance at an early age and spent several spells in prison. There he came into his own as a leader, rising to the rank of ‘emir’. He used his time well, studying many subjects including history and even Hebrew, which he used to gain an astute understanding of the workings of Zionism. He was eventually released, after 22 years in prison, as part of a 2011 prisoner swap. He went on to take up a senior role within Hamas, developing the movement’s emerging relationship with Iran. Eventually he became overall leader in Gaza, working to advance Palestinian unity.

Back in Khan Yunis he married Samar, with whom he had three children. In May 2021, long before the raid into Zionist Occupied Palestine from Gaza, on October 7th last year, their home was bombed from the air by the Israelis. Yahya refused to accept that the future for his family would be more of the same. The relentless persecution endured through the years, the denial of basic needs through from childhood, would not be the lot for them. And so, dedicated to securing for his people a future with dignity and honour, he set about planning for a different tomorrow.

‘Israel is made up of a nation of soldiers with few civilians’ — Benjamin Netanyahu

When the Palestinian Resistance crossed the fences holding them in the cage the Israelis made of Gaza, they entered onto stolen lands once their own. In a dawn raid on Zionist positions, they quickly overpowered the Israeli garrison tasked with securing their perpetual imprisonment. Such was the embarrassment for this ‘nation of soldiers’ and supposed regional superpower that many lies were quickly concocted to warp what was a devastating military operation into a supposed act of wanton terrorism. In truth, however, the Al-Qassam Brigades of the Resistance achieved a stunning success, using legitimate military force and action to secure their objective of overpowering Zionist forces to then take back to Gaza as many prisoners as could possibly be attained, for the purposes of enacting a later prisoner swap. History had taught them that this was the only conceivable way to return the thousands held unduly in the Zionist’s dungeons.

Behind the planning for this daring operation was the strategic mind of Yahya Al-Sinwar. At its end, many hundreds of Zionist forces lay dead on the battlefield, the Israeli army proving no match for the Palestinians in the hand-to-hand combat of that morning. In the chaos ensuing, hundreds more were butchered by their own as panicked Israeli commanders implemented the ‘Hannibal Doctrine’, killing with abandon all around them. This mass killing of their own people would soon be used, duplicitously, to license the total destruction of Gaza. In the year since, the world has bore witness to a crazed unrelenting genocide.

‘It hurts to lose people, especially unique leaders like Yahya Sinwar, but we are sure we will win in the end’ — Basem Naim

On 16th October, Yahya Al-Sinwar died on the front lines of battle — the final chapter for this humble warrior. In the ruins of Rafah, with fellow soldiers he engaged the enemy before retreating to shelter in a nearby building. Their position was pounded by artillery. In the onslaught, three of their number fell dead. But when Israeli forces tried to move in, unexpectedly they met with grenade fire. Driven back by a lone survivor, they again pounded the building from a distance. Fearful, yet, of a further response, rather than attempt to re-enter the battlefield, they sent in a drone. What it found was a fighter in military fatigues, severely wounded to the point of death. Yet still, even then, he resisted — yes, with his dying breaths. The man was Yahya Al-Sinwar. He did not break. He fought bravely to the end.

No better-fitting figure can there be for the suffering people of Palestine and their struggle than Yahya Ibrahim Hassan Al-Sinwar. A man of tremendous courage and character — a man amongst men — you refused to go meekly into the night. A soldier to the last, history will know you as a Founding Father of the coming Free Palestine, as a man whose convictions and actions were something much more than the personal, whose achievements will stand as a universal achievement, for Palestine is the universal cause. What you begun, in course, will change our world for the good. If there is a Heaven, without doubt, you are already there.

Sean Bresnahan is an independent Republican from Co. Tyrone who

blogs @ Claidheamh Soluis. Follow Sean Bresnahan on Twitter @bres79