Senior Hamas Leader Says Attack on Israel Was Secretly Planned for Years

A handful of Hamas leaders secretly strategized its bloody surprise attack on Israel for two years, according to a leader of the terrorist group.

Ali Barakeh, a member of Hamas’s exiled leadership, speaks in an interview with The Associated Press in Beirut, Lebanon, on Oct. 9, 2023. AP Photo/Hussein Malla

A senior leader for the Hamas terrorist group has claimed that the bloody attack on Israel that killed more than 1,200 people was secretly strategized for two years, adding that only a handful of leaders knew the “zero hour” of the invasion.

Ali Barakeh, a member of Hamas’s exiled leadership, told Russia Today in an interview translated by the Middle East Media Research Institute that Hamas deliberately refused to join the Palestinian Islamic Jihad in its fight against Israel for the last few years because it wanted to make Israelis believe it was busy “governing” the Gaza Strip.