Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz said Thursday that Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar had been killed by Israel’s armed forces.

“The elimination of Sinwar creates an opportunity for the immediate release of the hostages and a potential change that could lead to a new reality in Gaza – without Hamas and without Iranian control,” he said in a statement, according to NBC reporting.

Earlier in the day, the Israeli military said it was investigating the “possibility” that Sinwar was one of three militants killed during an operation in the Gaza Strip, whose identity it could not confirm at the time.

“The forces operating in the area continue to operate with caution,” it added in a social media post. CNBC could not independently verify the report.

In a social media update posted after the IDF communication, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant quoted a Bible quote: “You will pursue your enemies and they will fall before you by the sword. – Leviticus 26,” according to an NBC -translation.

He added: “Our enemies cannot hide. We will pursue them and eliminate them.”

National Security spokesman John Kirby said Washington was aware of reports that Sinwar may be dead, but U.S. officials had not independently verified them, according to NBC News. When the news broke, US President Joe Biden was on his way to Germany to meet with allied countries for talks on Ukraine and the Middle East.

Former leader of Hamas in the Gaza Strip, Sinwar took overall command of the Iran-backed organization in August, following the assassination of former political leader Ismail Haniyeh. His death marks the biggest blow Israel has dealt Hamas in the yearslong conflict sparked by the Palestinian militant group’s Oct. 7 terror attacks in the Jewish state, which Israel has accused Sinwar of orchestrating.

The offensive prompted the Israeli government of Benjamin Netanyahu to launch a retaliatory operation in the Gaza Strip in an attempt to dismantle the Palestinian group’s military capabilities and leadership.

According to the local health ministry, more than 42,000 Palestinian people have been killed in the Gaza Strip since October 7, while 101 people kidnapped from Israel are believed to remain Hamas hostages in the enclave. The Hostages Families Forum, which represents the families of the detainees, welcomed the Thursday news on social media but urged the Israeli government to use the opportunity as leverage to secure the return of the hostages.

The war in the Gaza Strip has expanded to include direct hostilities between Israel and Iran, along with clashes between the Jewish state and other Tehran-backed factions, such as the Yemeni Houthis and the Lebanese group Hezbollah – whose leader Hassan Nasrallah was killed by Israelis last month . troops in an airstrike in Beirut.

Markets are embroiled in the conflict in the Middle East, which now poses significant risks to oil supplies as Israel responds to the latest Iranian hostilities with attacks on Tehran’s energy infrastructure and export facilities.

Meanwhile, Houthi maritime attacks on ships they say are linked to Israel, the US or Britain – which have also been carried out against unaffiliated vessels – have disrupted a key commercial route in the Red Sea linking Asia-Pacific and the Mediterranean connects together.

Sinwar was born in a refugee camp in the Gaza enclave and spent at least 22 years of his adult life in Israeli prisons. He had been sentenced to life in prison in 1989 for directing the murder of two Israeli soldiers and four Palestinians he believed to be collaborators, having already made a name for himself as “the Butcher of Khan Yunis” for his hunt for Palestinians whose he suspected they did. work with Israel.

However, he was released early in a highly controversial prisoner swap in 2011, in which more than a thousand Palestinian prisoners were exchanged for an Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit, who had been kidnapped by Hamas five years earlier.

Sinwar later said in interviews that he used his time in prison to learn to speak, read and write Hebrew, and to understand the psychology and behavior of his Israeli captors. In 2015, he was designated a terrorist by the US government.

The International Criminal Court said in May it was filing arrest warrant applications against Sinwar and Haniyeh for war crimes and crimes against humanity. At the same time, it filed arrest warrant applications for war crimes and crimes against humanity against Netanyahu and Gallant.

It is unclear who would succeed Sinwar as leader of Hamas and what impact his death could have on stalled ceasefire negotiations.