He saved the life of Hamas’s leader. Then they murdered his nephew

Hamas’s surprise October 7 attacks stunned Israel. But not everyone was caught unaware. When he learned the news, Dr. Yuval Bitton says he felt it was coming – and knew immediately who was behind it.

Hamas’s surprise October 7 attacks stunned Israel. But not everyone was caught unaware. When he learned the news, Dr. Yuval Bitton says he felt it was coming – and knew immediately who was behind it. “I know the person who planned and conceived and initiated this criminal attack,” Bitton told CNN’s Christiane Amanpour. “I have known him since 1996 – not only him but the entire Hamas leadership in Gaza – and it was clear to me that this is what they were planning.” Bitton spent years working as a dentist in Israel’s Nafha Prison. It was there he met “the person” – Yahya Sinwar, a Hamas militant convicted of murder who would go on to become the group’s leader in Gaza – saying he saved his life by helping diagnose a brain tumor. Bitton says he spent hundreds of hours conversing with Sinwar, providing him with rare insight into the mind of the top Hamas official. But his actions have left him tormented. Bitton blames Sinwar for the murder of his nephew, who was killed after Hamas militants raided his home on October 7. In 2004, Sinwar had come to the prison’s clinic complaining of neck pain and losing his balance.