Hamas terrorists were reportedly high on a stimulant dubbed the “poor man’s cocaine” during their attacks on Israel earlier this month.
Captagon pills, a synthetic amphetamine-type stimulant, were found in the pockets of Hamas gunmen killed or captured by Israeli forces during the Oct 7 cross-border raid, Israel’s Channel 12 reported.
The news channel said that the terrorists had taken the drug before committing their “inhumane murders”. More than 1,400 Israelis were killed during the attack.
Other recent reports have also suggested the Hamas terrorists may have been acting under the influence of drugs.
A witness to the group’s rampage described the gunmen as having “crazy joy in their eyes, like they were high on something” while they were rampaging from house to house, killing people and taking hostages, according to The New Yorker magazine.
Captagon was the brand name of a stimulant first produced in Germany in the 1960s to help treat attention-deficit disorders, narcolepsy and other conditions.
It was later discontinued but an illicit version of the drug continued to be produced in Eastern Europe and later in the Arab world, becoming prominent in the Syrian Civil War that erupted in the wake of anti-government protests in 2011.
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It was reportedly used widely by the Islamic State group, whose fighters were thought to consume Captagon to stay awake on the conflict’s front lines.
The illicit version – also nicknamed “the drug of jihad” or “poor man’s cocaine” – is thought to be made of a mix of fenethylline, caffeine and other fillers. It generates focus and staves off sleep and hunger.
It is currently mostly produced in Syria, where trade in the drug is a financial lifeline for the Assad regime, generating billions of pounds a year, according to the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.
“The Syrian regime’s trafficking of billions of dollars’ worth of Captagon has helped to spread violence across the region; Hamas terrorists’ reported use of the drug only adds to the carnage,” said David Adesnik, a senior fellow and the director of research at the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, a Washington-based research institute.
Footage of Hamas’s attack earlier this month shows a vehicle used by the terrorist group with a large bag of white powder on one of its seats alongside instructions for the assault, codenamed Operation Al-Aqsa Flood.
In recent years, Captagon has become popular in Hamas-controlled Gaza, according to Channel 12.
The news channel reported that tens of thousands of Palestinians are addicted to the drug, with dependency rates particularly high among unemployed youth.