Diminished, wounded and half-crumpled in a sofa chair amidst the rubble of a Gaza living room, Yahya Sinwar had time to take in the reality of his final moments alive.

Drone footage taken by Israeli forces shows the Hamas leader’s final act of defiance was the forlorn flinging of a random stick at the buzzing machine.

He missed. A short time later Israel killed the man at the top of its most-wanted list; the terrorist who masterminded the atrocities of October 7 in the hope it would unleash a regional “flood” of devastation against the hated Zionist state.

While the conflict is not over, Sinwar’s decision to send thousands of Hamas fighters into Israel now looks like one the greatest miscalculations of our time.

It has wrought untold civilian deaths in Israel, on his own people in Gaza and now Lebanon. It blooded a new generation in an age-old battle.

But more significantly, the stunning news delivered in the early hours of Friday morning, Australian time, of Sinwar’s death has delivered a palpable sense of an inflection point reached.

It allows for the possibility, difficult to stomach given the costs that led to this point, that the human agonies of the past 12 months might now give way to something more hopeful.

It will come as an enormous relief to the Albanese government.

Trapped between the political left and the Greens in particular demanding blind and forceful condemnation of Israel’s actions and Peter Dutton’s hardline unwaveringly pro-Netanyahu stance, Labor has floundered. It has upset many and pleased few.

Sinwar’s elimination means the conflict now looks to be headed towards a place that fits more naturally with Labor’s call for an end to hostilities.

A two-state solution was never something Israel’s public would even begin to consider so long as the fugitive lived. Labor’s position left it vulnerable to the charge that it was rewarding terrorism and ignoring Israel’s need to ensure its people are safe.

But today’s events mean Dutton will need more than a simplistic assertion of Israel’s right to defend itself given the challenges that now look to be emerging.

Albanese is closer than ever to the position of allies, led by the United States, that are pressing Israel for peace.

Sinwar’s death, Albanese said, “can be a vital turning point in this devastating conflict”, and should now lead to “a ceasefire that will break the cycle of violence” and put the region on a “path to an enduring two-state solution”.

“Sinwar’s death is an opportunity for this war to end,” echoed Foreign Minister Penny Wong.

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Hours earlier, US President Joe Biden told Netanyahu that “now’s the time” to move toward a ceasefire in Gaza.

US secretary of state Antony Blinken, he said, will soon go to Israel to discuss what happens next. “We will work out, what is the day after now?” Biden said. “How do we secure Gaza and move on?”

The Coalition foreign affairs spokesperson Simon Birmingham echoed the sentiment: “May the elimination of another Iranian-sponsored terrorist leader take the Middle East one step closer to the ultimate peace.”

“Hamas should use this moment to release all hostages, surrender remaining terrorist capabilities and secure a ceasefire,” he added.

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Sinwar’s death will help western governments around the world

John Blaxland, a professor of international security and intelligence studies at the Australian National University, agrees there is now “scope for some kind of changing of the narrative and maybe a breakthrough”.

“Sinwar has been a key obstacle to any kind of resolution or cessation of fighting,” Blaxland says.

His removal opens a door not only for Israel to change its tune, but for Saudi Arabia to come into Gaza to fund and supervise rebuilding without Hamas.

It may even put the Middle East back on the pathway it was headed for just before Sinwar unleashed his fighters — one that offered up an end to “forever wars” and economic renewal based on rapprochement between Israel and Saudi Arabia.

Justin Bassi, executive director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, says Israel’s success on “multiple battlefields” is changing the strategic narrative.

It has broken the “sense of fatalism” in western capitals that “nobody can stop Hamas or Hezbollah”, or their backers in Iran.

Bassi reckons Israel’s actions in Gaza and Lebanon — as well as this week’s little-noticed US raid using B-2 stealth bombers on hardened underground weapons sites in Yemen — are demonstrating that military risk-taking can open a pathway to something more stable.

“The pressure the Australian government is getting from its left flank is going to be lessened because there’s genuine proof in front of everyone’s eyes,” he said.

“The recent operational success of Israel, now joined by the US on the Houthis, is going to help not just the Australian government, but western governments around the world, show what the suffering is for.

“People understand that in conflict there’s going to be suffering. But there needs to be a purpose. And the last few months have given greater clarity to that purpose.”

Hope after a long year of division

Labor has had a tough week on the domestic front. For the first time, Newspoll shows Albanese has fallen behind Dutton.

And that was before the prime minister’s real estate venture emerged to the infuriation of many of his colleagues.

What on earth was he thinking? Where is his political judgement? And why does he seem to be thinking about his life after the Lodge?

But the resulting media obsession with Albanese’s beachfront property ended up overshadowing a different kind of property story.

Labor MP Peter Khalil — who is the government’s first special envoy for social cohesion — arrived at his Melbourne electorate office on Monday to find the walls vandalised with red paint slogans. A door was painted with an inverted triangle, a symbol linked with Hamas.

Khalil, the son of Egyptian migrants, knows all too well the stakes in the Middle East.

Friday’s events offer hope for Labor that things might be turning towards something more positive after a long year of division.