Israeli president says Hamas operative had instructions for cyanide chemical weapon

A Hamas operative killed in the militant group’s conflict with Israel was found carrying instructions on how to make a cyanide chemical weapon, said Israel President Isaac Herzog.

In an interview on Sunday with Sky News, Herzog showed the British media outlet a series of documents with diagrams that were found on a USB key on the body of a Hamas operative killed in Kibbutz Be’eri in Israel.

The documents included “precise instructions for preparing a device for dispersing cyanide agents,” the Israeli government’s office said in a statement following the interview.

“This is how shocking the situation is where we’re looking at the instructions that are given on how to operate and how to create a kind of non-professional chemical weapon with cyanide,” Herzog told Sky News.

Sky News said it was unable to independently verify Herzog’s claims, but noted the source of the documents is from a 2003 al Qaeda manual and included the ingredients needed to make a chemical bomb.

Alistair Bunkar, a Middle East correspondent for Sky News, said the media outlet sent the documents to a British chemical weapons expert, who said the documents show ingredients that could build a credible chemical weapon.

“Al Qaeda spent a lot of time and effort developing a chemical weapon based on cyanide,” Hamish de Bretton Gordon, former head of the UK military’s Chemical, Biological and Nuclear Weapons regiment, told Sky News.

Herzog and the statement from the government claimed the document indicates a link between al Qaeda and Hamas, though Sky News noted the manual does not prove such a connection.

Nothing the methodology may be similar, Bunker said a direct link between Hamas and al Qaeda is “unlikely” to be “strong, if at all,” given the current strength of the Islamic State.

When Sky News asked Michael Epstein, a major general in the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) about Herzog’s claims, Epstein said, “On the capabilities that you ask about, the chemicals … we are still looking for evidence about whether they had it or not.”

“But the orders were there, as our President Herzog mentioned yesterday, orders were there on how to kill, how many to kill, how many to take as hostages,” Epstein continued.

Chemical weaponry would escalate the already deadly conflict that has killed over 6,400 lives on both sides.

Fighting entered its 17th day on Monday following Hamas’s bloody massacre on Israel, which began on Oct. 7 and has killed 1,400 Israelis — including hundreds of civilians in their homes, at a bus stop and at a music festival.

Israel responded with a bombardment of Gaza, launching hundreds of air strikes into the region. An estimated 5,087 people in Gaza have been killed in the conflict, including 2,055 children, 1,119 women and 217 elderly, Gaza’s health ministry reported Monday. There also have been warnings of a humanitarian catastrophe.

An additional 15,273 individuals have been wounded, per the ministry, as hospitals and humanitarian agencies warn of dwindling medicine and medical supplies, along with limited access to food, fuel and water.

While Israel has yet to launch an expected ground offensive into Gaza, it has issued repeated orders for over 1 million Palestinians to flee their neighborhoods in the north and head south.

The United States has largely supported Israel’s pledge to eliminate Hamas in response to the attacks, drawing a parallel to America’s war on terror after the 9/11 attacks. 

During a visit to Tel Aviv last week, President Biden announced an agreement to allow for a small shipment of aid to enter Gaza. Two aid convoys carrying food, water and medical supplies were allowed to enter Gaza over the weekend using the Rafah crossing with Egypt, though humanitarian leaders have stressed more aid is needed.