Justice Department announces terrorism charges against senior Hamas leaders after hostage deaths

Charges detail alleged crimes dating back to 1997

The US Department of Justice on Tuesday unsealed a sweeping set of charges against six leaders of Hamas.

The case, originally filed in New York federal court in February, accuses the Hamas officials of a range of terrorism-related offenses stretching from 1997 through the present conflict with Israel that began on October 7.

“The Justice Department has charged Yahya Sinwar and other senior leaders of Hamas for financing, directing, and overseeing a decades-long campaign to murder American citizens and endanger the national security of the United States,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement accompanying the announcement. “On October 7th, Hamas terrorists, led by these defendants, murdered nearly 1200 people, including over 40 Americans, and kidnapped hundreds of civilians.”

The indictment names six Hamas leaders spread across the Gaza Strip, Qatar, and Lebanon: Ismail Haniyeh, the former chairman of the Hamas politburo; Yahya Sinwar, the current leader of Hamas; Mohammad Al-Masri, also known as Mohammed Deif, the former commander of al-Qassam Brigades, Marwan Issa, the former deputy commander of al-Qassam Brigades; Khaled Meshaal, head of the Hamas diaspora office; and Ali Baraka, head of Hamas’s unit for national relations abroad.

After the charges were filed, Issa and Deif were killed in Israeli airstrikes, and Haniyeh was assassinated during a visit to Hamas patron Iran.

The announcement comes as ceasefire talks between Israel and Gaza have failed to produce a concrete resolution and U.S. and Israeli officials face ever-growing pressure to bring about an end to the war.

Israeli soldiers in a tank as it drives along the border with the Gaza Strip on August 7, 2024 in Southern Israel, Israel (Getty Images)

Israel said on Sunday it had recovered the bodies of six hostages killed in a tunnel under the Palestinian city of Rafah, including Hersh Goldberg-Polin, an Israeli-American who had become one of the most widely known of the more than 200 hostages captured by the Palestinian militant group.

The discovery prompted yet another round of large-scale protests critical of prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the streets of Israel.

In May, the International Criminal Court announced it would seek war crimes warrants for the arrest of Netanyahu, Israeli defence minister Yoav Gallant, as well as Sinwar, Deif, and Haniyeh.