Ahmed al-Jaabari was born in 1960 and lived in the neighborhood of
Shuja’iya in eastern Gaza. He was the Deputy Commander of Al-Qassam
Brigades and its military commander on the ground.
Ahmad tops
the Israeli ‘wanted list’ which considers him to be “the chief of staff
of the Hamas movement” in reference to his high rank in the movement and
his planning of a large number of operations against the Jewish state.
Al-Jaabari remained the third in the Qassam Brigades’ Military
Council until Israel assassinated Sheikh Salah Chehadeh in 2002 while
failing to kill Mohammad al-Dayf in 2003.
However, the latter’s severe
injury handicapped him, making al-Jaabari the first man and real
commander of the Al-Qassam Brigades.
Al-Jaabari had great
capacities and managed to achieve many breakthroughs, setting a strong
military system for the Brigades and overseeing many operations against
Israel.
Al-Jaabari was the target of many Israeli assassination
attempts, mainly the one he survived with minor injuries in 2004. His
elder son Mohammad, his brother and three of his relatives were killed
when Israeli jets pounded his house in the Shuja’iya neighborhood of
Gaza.
Israel accused him of being behind the detention of
Israeli Sergeant Gilad Shalit. Al-Jaabari was the one behind the deal to
swap 1,000 Palestinian prisoners with Shalit, including the 450
prisoners Israel refused to release.
He trasnferred from Fatah
to Hamas in the early eighties and spent 13 years in Israeli prisons on
charges of involvement in Fatah military groups that plotted a commando
operation in 1982.
Following his release in 1995, he focused on
the management of an institution affiliated with Hamas and concerned
with the affairs of prisoners and ex-prisoners. In 1997, he worked with
the Islamic Salvation Party to face the Palestinian authority’s security
prosecutions at the time.
In 1998, the Palestinian Preventive
Security Service detained him for 2 years on charges of affiliation to
the Al-Qassam Brigades. He was then released with the beginning of the
uprising following Israel’s shelling of Gaza’s security apparatuses.
For the full LBCI report, watch the video above