A different look at that Deif dude. Who is Mohammed Diab Ibrahim al-Masri? The mysterious man known as Mohammed Deif, ‘the guest’, ‘the mastermind’, ‘the cat with nine lives’

That Deif dude. Palestinian nickname, The Mastermind. Israeli nickname, The Cat With Nine Lives. Born as Mohammad Masri in Khan Yunis, refugee camp, in 1965, about three years after that Sinwar dude was also born there. It’s almost like someone wanted to create a cradle for resistance fighters there. Before 1948 his family lived in the village of Al-Qubayba. This village is further away from Gaza than the places outside of Gaza from which the families of most other Hamas members originally hail. It was an all Muslim Palestinian village. In 1945 there were 1,060 Muslim living there. Today nobody lives there, because the village was depopulated, meaning ethnically cleansed by the Israelis. According to the UN partition plan it should have gone to the newly envisioned Arab state outside players decided upon and that never came to be.

This village had a surprisingly rich history and was already known in crusader times. Back in the early 16^th century it was part of the Ottoman empire, like the rest of Palestine. In 1948 it was attacked before the end of the British mandate in Operation Barak, part of Plan Dalet, the plan to get rid of the Arabs, adopted on the 10^th of March 1948, so before the Arab armies entered the territory of the former mandate. A beautiful Palestinian dress worn in this village back in 1910 survives to this day, but not in Palestine. It’s part of the collection of the Museum of International Folk Art at Santa Fe, New Mexico.

En passant, the state of New Mexico used to be part of Mexico, but became part of the US in a war described by future president Grant, who participated in the war as a junior officer: ‘one of the most unjust ever waged by a stronger against a weaker nation.’ And: ‘We had no claim on Mexico. Texas had no claim beyond the Nueces River, and yet we pushed on to the Rio Grande and crossed it. I am always ashamed of my country when I think of that invasion.’ What does that have to with Deif? Well, the United States, not unfamiliar with annexing land, to this day does whatever it can to make sure Deif doesn’t get to live where his family lived before 1948. You can see the exact dress mentioned, a ‘thobe’ online, on the American museum’s website here: http://collection.internationalfolkart.org/objects/2620/thobe?fbclid=IwZXh0bgNhZW0CMTAAAR0XI4oJC3xdkJL9gQxVV27FEcr-_9Jmo8mVyv8YNMT8_MG02i0VCCOLC20_aem_AAP9v2noCa-GlscW15TOuA

Back to the, objectively speaking, very handsome guy with the melancholy heartthrob eyes in the picture. Am specifically adding that, because the western media will rarely portray Palestinians as handsome or pretty, not even when their striking features are staring you in the face. The blonde Ukrainians get better traction in that regard.

As a kid Deif left school for a while to support his family. Later he got a chemistry degree from a university in Gaza. He had a theatre group there, called ‘The Returners’. No, he did not go on to play chemistry teacher turned drug lord Walter White on the show Breaking Bad, set in New Mexico, with this background.

Deif joined Hamas in 1987. Jewish scholar Zachary Foster, who has studied the group, says back then Hamas was a peaceful movement, but started looking at violent options after Israel cracked down hard on peaceful protests. In 1989 Deif was arrested for his activism by the Israeli authorities and held for 16 months. He was released in a… prisoner exchange. It’s not hard to figure out why Hamas to this day is so keen on taking hostages.

Deif means ‘guest’, a name possibly given to him, because of his nomadic lifestyle. This is because of the traveling theatre group he is still a part of. No, it’s because he wants to avoid being blown up by Israel along with everyone else who would be standing, sitting or lying next to him.

In the 1990s, while the west was being taking by storm by sitcom Friends and Britney Spears, while mostly doing nothing to stop massacres from happening in places like Yugoslavia and Rwanda and history had ended with the fall of the Soviet Union, to name just a few so 1990s things, Deif started organizing suicide bombings. An example are the Jaffa road bus attacks. In two bombings 45 people died. In the first bombing nine Israeli soldiers died, but the rest were civilians. Among the dead were children of all ages, infants, toddlers and teenagers.

Deif masterminded these and Adnun Awul supplied the explosives. This was partly a reaction to the Shin Bet killing of Yahya Ayyash. Ayyash had a bachelor in Electrical Engineering and wanted to get a master’s degree in Jordan, but he was denied a student Visa. He then joined Hamas where he perfected the technique of suicide bombings and found ways to create bombs with household items in the heavily blockaded West Bank. As a child he had received a reward for being so good at memorizing the Quran. Kamil Hamad, the uncle of a childhood friend of Ayyash seems to have been paid a huge sum of money by Israel to play a key role in killing him. Deif was also close to Emad Akel, another Hamsas commander. Growing up he was more interested in geography than politics, but circumstances had him opt to join Hamas. He became a master of disguise and killed 11 Israeli soldiers. He was killed himself by Israel with the help of a Palestinian informant, Walid Hamdiya, who was condemned to death by firing squad by Hamas for his betrayal. One wonders why the Palestinians are so ruthless when it comes to weeding out potential snitches among them.

Deif went on to reorganize Hamas into a real military fighting force. He has played a pivotal role in the Palestinian resistance techniques combining rockets and tunnels. These are about the only things the Gazans could have developed to resist Israel militarily. Israel is a regional begemoth when it comes to military firepower. To have any kind of chance to hamper so much military might only a very clever strategy stands any kind of a chance. Deif has developed a guerilla strategy that is uniquely suited for the ‘arena’ in which the Palestinians have to confront Israel. There are no mountains to run to, there is no jungle to hide in, there are no rivers or other natural protective barriers. Without questioning the morals of the Hamas approach at this point, but purely seen on its military merits, it’s a miracle that the Palestinians have had any kind of military success against Israel after the full spectrum dominance they have been facing since 1980s, if not much earlier, without any serious support from major allies.

Deif is Israel’s most wanted man. He’s been so since 1995. This means he’s been able to evade capture for about 30 years even though arguably the best and most experienced secrets agencies in the world are desperately trying to take him out. Say what you want, but in the gray matter dimension the man must be well supplied.

The Palestinian Authority, Israel’s kapo club used to oppress the Palestinians in the West Bank, arrested Deif in 2000, but the slippery fish vanished.

Officially hey have already tried eight (!!) times to target him. Who knows how many times they have tried to do so unofficially.

His wife, infant son and 3 year old daughter were killed by an Israeli air strike in 2014.

It’s rumored Deif orchestrated the succesful raid which led to the capture of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit in June 2006. His actions were also crucial in hiding Shalit for five years while Israel’s forces, with their massive budgets, pulled all the stops to locate Shalit. This soldier was later swapped for 1,026 Palestinian prisoners. A staggering success.

Deif maintained a close relationship with the popular Iranian general Soleimani who assassinated by the US in 2020. This officer has been described as ‘a genius of asymmetric warfare.’ Former Mossad Director Yossi Cohen said about Soleimani that he: ‘personally tightened a noose around Israel’s neck. This same man must have admired Deif quite a bit, because in their correspondence he calls him ‘a dear brother’ and ‘a living martyr.’

Deif also created the so called ‘Shadow Unit’. This is a special unit within the structure of the al-Qassam Brigades. They have to guard enemy captives. They have to treat these captives honorably, according to the rules of Islam, they have to provide for their needs.

It’s possible he was extra motivated to plan for the raid on October 7^th, primarily conceived as a raid to get hostages to swap for Palestinian prisoners, when he saw Israeli forces storm Al-Aqsa during Ramadan. The decision for the attack was taken by Deif and Yahya Sinwar, that other dude born in Khan Yunis, whose family was only flused out of their home in 1948.

In the build-up he deceived Israel into thinking that Hamas was not ready for a fight and could be appeased by throwing them a few bones, such as allowing a small number of Gazans to commute into Israel every day to get a higher wage than is typically possible to get in the blockaded Gaza enclave.

In a radio broadcast on the day of the attack he made it clear the attack was a retaliatory attack for Israel’s ‘orgy of occupation’, the desecration of the Al-Aqsa mosque, for killing hundreds of Palestinians recently, and for ignoring international laws and resolutions. Perhaps the most risky thing he did that day was calling on everyone, including Arab Israelis, to ‘expel the occupiers and demolish the walls’.

This probably helped to create an atmosphere in which some regular Palestinians, likely the most disgruntled individuals among them, and also the kind of criminals you will find in any society all over the world, to also spill through the fence and start committing violent acts without any clear cut plan or any sort of constructive intention. From what we know this did nothing to rally Arab Israelis that idea who have nothing to gain in the short term and literally everything to lose if they join in this sort of event. They also lack the means and the organisation to aid such an attack in any substantial way. The vast majority of them don’t play any essential roles in protecting the border area. As long as Israel feels safe it can maintain a Jewish majority inside Israel, can slowly but surely annex the West Bank this Arab minority inside Israel is allowed to have a life that is easier than in Gaza or the West Bank. They also serve as evidence that Israel is not a racist country at all and a true democracy.

Too many experts like Max Blumenthal, Illan Pappe and Norman Finkelstein have made it clear that Israel’s goal is to maintain that Jewish majority, so claims to being a real democracy and a non-racist country are hard to maintain. Some have pointed out that everything Israel propagates about itself is a painstakingly crafted myth that starts unraveling once you start looking a little closer with unbiased eyes.

Back to Deif. He also said that day: “Every day the occupation storm our villages, towns and cities in the West Bank and raid houses, kill, injure, destroy and detain. At the same time, it confiscates thousands of acres of our land, uproots our people from their houses to build settlements while its criminal siege continues on Gaza.”

Israel has so far stamped out the lives of his brother, his nephew, his niece, his wife, his 3 year old daughter and his 7 month old son. There is footage of Deif covered in blood after an Israeli strike on his car in 2002. It was long believed the assassination attempts cost Deif an eye and limbs, making him look like some sort of frazzled pirate in the minds of some. It’s possible he takes tranquilizers daily to treat headaches from schrapnel lodged in his skull.

It’s now believed he does have both arms and legs and can walk, but that he has a visible limb and sometimes uses a wheelchair. Because of all the times he evaded death by an Israeli bomb he’s become something like an elusive folk hero amongst Palestinians. He is most of all a military leader, and not a political leader, so people didn’t single him out for criticism when faced with the living conditions in Gaza which had been steadily declining long before October 7^th 2023.

He has several surviving children. When in 2014 his wife, Widad Asfoura, their daughter Sarah (3) and son Ali (7 months) were killed, one other son, Omar, was injured and survived, and one, Hala, went missing for two days, but also survived. He has two other sons, Bahaa and Khaled.

Israel and its defenders now fervently hope they have killed this man, so they can finally shout to the world that they don’t target kids. It’s too tragic to laugh about this, I know. The Israeli strike supposedly targeting Deif has already killed close to 100 people at the time of writing. Whether they finally managed to kill him doesn’t matter. He’s already set into motion a process that has put Israel on a path of self-destruction. By opting for a revenge orgy instead of coming up with a real solution, by not setting up real safe zones for the population in Gaza, before going after Gaza, Israel has exposed itself as the worst baby killing entity of this century with a shocking disregard for human life that manages to completely overshadow what happened on October 7^th. This must be the worst own goal since Hitler invaded the Soviet Union without packing winter clothing. The Palestinians are paying a frightful price, but there is no way Israel recovers from what it has done to so many women, children and innocent men. That the tiniest fraction of two million caged people celebrated the events of October 7^th after decades of being on the receiving end of violence doesn’t justify Israel’s stupendously amateuristic and sadistic conduct of this war it still hasn’t won after nine months and having an endless supply of the most modern fire power.

Just like Sinwar, Deif is undoubtedly a controversial figure. It’s easy to see why someone would label him ‘a mastermind’, he is clearly very intelligent and equipped with a more than decent grasp of strategy. It’s hard for anyone not involved in this decades long struggle to understand his actions from a moral perspective. I comfortably allow myself to think I would never devise ways to blow a bus with children on it. Children are the holiest of the holiest to me. But nobody has ever tried to steal my home, a fact am now more grateful for every day, because, looking at history, it could very easily have been otherwise.

I wrote this account for you hoping to shed some light on a little understood figure. I also wrote it to try and ‘infect’ you with a passion for understanding the human world.

Forgive me the self-indulgent jokes here and there which make it fun and bearable to write about these dark topics that are often presented in a seemingly objective fashion, but they so very rarely are.

If you get a little peeved when you see people enthusiastically comment/pontificate on issues they refuse to read books about or study in any serious manner you can send them this or some of my other articles. It won’t help much at all, because they have already proven that understanding or knowing is not what motivates their behaviour, but maybe someone else may see it and get curious.

Stay inquisitive, don’t get too caught in the 24/7 catchy soundbites tsunami and be kind to yourself and others.

Apologies for any typos. This is not my job. I already have two jobs and I prioritize spending time with my son as much as my little obsessions with politics and history allow.

Small acts of kindness in every day life have a much bigger impact in creating a more peaceful world than we give them credit for. That and daily training to identify our own bias and to learn as much as we can about the way fellow human beings experience life on this battered, wee bit polluted, rock floating around in space with living beings on it, still the greatest miracle ever discovered in the known world by only creature that as far as we know can label itself.