Mohammad Masri was born in 1965 in the Khan Yunis Refugee Camp in the Gaza Strip which was set up after the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. After joining Hamas in 1990, he became known as Mohammed Deif (Deif meaning guest in Arabic), owing to his nomadic lifestyle.
Deif joined Hamas in 1990 with the help of Yahya Ayyash and Adnan al-Ghoul, his long-time associates. In 1994, Deif was involved in the kidnappings and killing of IDF soldiers Shahar Simani, Aryeh Frankenthal and Nachshon Wachsman. He was personally responsible, along with Yahya Ayyash, for the bus bombings in Jerusalem and Ashkelon, attacks that killed about 50 Israelis. Five suicide bombers he sent into Israel in March 2000 were killed by Yamam. After his release from PA prison in April 2001, he was involved in a ‘wave of bombing attacks’ that lasted several months during the second intifada.[5]
Deif became the…
