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On the ground, Yahya Sinwar has achieved for Israeli extremists what hard-line Israeli leaders like Menachem Begin, Yitzhak Shamir and even Ariel Sharon could not. Sharon, who withdrew from Gaza in 2005, dismantled settlements and handed the territory over to the Palestinian Authority.

Why did Sinwar do this? I cannot say for certain why he launched the Oct. 7 attack or who was behind it. Was it ignorance on his part or was it orchestrated by Iran? This is what I imagine, though there is no evidence to support it.

The Oct. 7, 2023, attack has so far resulted in more than 40,000 deaths, a quarter of a million wounded and millions of displaced people, many of whom are now struggling to survive on just one meal a day. As winter approaches, they will need shelter and blankets. Sinwar’s assault failed to liberate even an inch of land, which he claimed was the goal. Instead, Israel has grown more powerful and more entrenched within Palestine and the broader region.

Sinwar has destroyed the Palestinian cause internationally, accomplishing what even the infamous Abu Nidal could not. The images of the Israeli dead from Oct. 7 — children, women and the elderly — will dominate the narrative, alongside the images of the hostages, some of whom were children, infants and the elderly. This does not excuse Benjamin Netanyahu’s crimes in deliberately killing Gaza’s innocent civilians. However, Sinwar has successfully ignited a wave of mutual anger and hatred.

Just as Osama bin Laden led to the downfall of Al-Qaeda with the Sept. 11 attacks, Sinwar has done the same

Abdulrahman Al-Rashed

Sinwar has effectively buried Hamas, destroyed his ally Hezbollah and ended Palestinian Islamic Jihad’s presence in Gaza and the West Bank.

These are the outcomes of the Oct. 7 battle. It does not matter what the leaders outside Gaza claim — whether Khaled Mashal declares victory or Ali Khamenei celebrates Hezbollah’s “victory” as he mourns the deaths of hundreds of leaders who could not even fire a single shot in defense.

Just as Osama bin Laden led to the downfall of Al-Qaeda with the Sept. 11 attacks, Sinwar has done the same.

If I believed conspiracy theories, I would not be able to resist the thought that Sinwar or those around him were working for Mossad, which is known for infiltrating Palestinian organizations, especially within Israeli prisons. The attack was carried out to justify everything that followed. The truth is that incompetent leaders are more dangerous than double agents.

Under the leadership of Ismail Haniyeh, Mashal and Sheikh Yassin, Hamas’ wars were small raids and limited operations — stabbings, car rammings or the kidnapping of a soldier or two. Their goal was to keep the Palestinian cause alive and possibly reach political solutions, understanding the power imbalance. Then Sinwar arrived with an operation that can only be explained in one of three ways.

Firstly, he is part of Al-Qaeda, not Hamas, who infiltrated the movement, rose to power and executed a suicide mission aimed at destruction, not liberation. In this, he has succeeded.

Or, like other Hamas leaders, he is linked to Iran but acted on Tehran’s agenda without proper calculations. Iran’s regional goals, like halting India’s trade corridor or securing dominance over Iraq, were at play in the Oct. 7 operation. Yet neither Sinwar nor Iran have achieved their objectives.

The victims of Oct. 7 were neither leaders nor soldiers in these wars, yet they are suffering their consequences

Abdulrahman Al-Rashed

The final possibility is that Sinwar is politically ignorant. He may not have anticipated that an attack on Israeli civilians would result in such high casualties or he did not study Israel’s potential responses. Perhaps, in his ignorance, he thought — like many others — that Israel would refrain from fighting and instead negotiate for the hostages.

Militarily and politically, the Oct. 7 attack has destroyed the two most significant armed organizations in the Middle East — Hamas and Hezbollah. This may serve regional and international goals, but the humanitarian catastrophe is indescribable. There seems to be no solution in sight for Gaza or Lebanon, where nearly 5 million people are either displaced or at risk of displacement. This is an overwhelming number, far beyond what international organizations can handle.

Now is the time to unite in saving the victims of Oct. 7, who were neither leaders nor soldiers in these wars yet are suffering their consequences. We must also prevent future disasters caused by Sinwar, including the risk of civil war in Lebanon and the displacement of millions of Gazans from their land, which Israel may then seize.

The humanitarian aspect also has a political purpose: to take the next steps in correcting the long history of wrong decisions in Palestine and Lebanon.

Oct. 7 marks a pivotal moment and its consequences continue to unfold.

• Abdulrahman Al-Rashed is a Saudi journalist and intellectual. He is the former general manager of Al-Arabiya news channel and former editor-in-chief of Asharq Al-Awsat, where this article was originally published.