Senior Hamas commander appears on video despite Israeli claim he was killed

Hamas commander Hussein Fayyad, whom the Israeli military claimed to have killed last May, has appeared in a newly surfaced video, according to the Palestinian media outlet Arab48.

The footage, widely shared on social media on Wednesday, shows a man resembling Fayyad speaking at a funeral in northern Gaza, standing amid the ruins of a bombed-out building, with a group of men listening.

Fayyad is the commander of Hamas’s Beit Hanoun Battalion. Beit Hanoun was one of the first areas targeted by Israel in 2023.

In his speech, he praised Gaza’s resistance against Israel’s military assault, saying, “When the strong doesn't achieve its goals, it is defeated, but the weak, which prevented the strong from achieving its goals - it is the victor.”

He also dismissed Israel’s offensive as futile.

Read more: Senior Hamas commander appears on video despite Israeli claim he was killed