Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh assassinated in Iran
Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh has been killed by an air strike in the Iranian capital, Iran and the militant group say, blaming Israel for a shock assassination that risks escalating the regional conflict on multiple fronts.
Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh speaks during a press briefing after his meeting with Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amirabdollahian in Tehran, Iran, Tuesday, March 26, 2024. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)
There was no immediate comment from Israel, which has vowed to kill Haniyeh and other Hamas leaders over the group’s October 7 attack on southern Israel.
The strike early on Wednesday came just after Haniyeh had attended the inauguration of Iran’s new president in Tehran, Iran said.
Ismail Haniyeh was in Tehran for the swearing-in of Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian. (AP PHOTO)
The killing could trigger retaliation against Israel from Iran or its powerful Lebanese ally Hezbollah and prompt Hamas to pull out of months of negotiations for a ceasefire in Gaza.
Hours earlier, Israel carried out a rare strike in the Lebanese capital Beirut that it said killed a top Hezbollah commander who was allegedly behind a weekend rocket attack that killed 12 young people in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights.
Hezbollah said on Wednesday it was still searching for the body of Fouad Shukur in the rubble of the building that was struck.
The US and other nations had already been scrambling to prevent the Golan Heights strike from spiralling into an all-out war between Israel and Hezbollah when word came of the dramatic assassination of Hamas’ top political leader, Haniyeh, in Tehran.
There was no immediate reaction from the White House to the killing of Haniyeh.
An Israeli military spokesman declined to comment. Israel often does not comment on assassinations carried out by its Mossad intelligence agency or strikes on other countries.
It has repeatedly vowed to eliminate Hamas leaders wherever they are for the October 7 attack in which Hamas-led militants killed 1200 people and took some 250 others hostage.
Hamas said Haniyeh was killed “in a Zionist air strike on his residence in Tehran” after he attended the swearing-in of Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on Tuesday, along with other Hamas officials and officials from Hezbollah and allied groups.
“Hamas declares to the great Palestinian people and the people of the Arab and Islamic nations and all the free people of the world, brother leader Ismail Ismail Haniyeh a martyr,” Hamas said in its terse statement.
In the West Bank, the internationally backed Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas condemned Haniyeh’s killing, calling it a “cowardly act and dangerous development”.
Political factions in the occupied territory called for strikes in protest at the killing.
Haniyeh left the Gaza Strip in 2019 and had lived in exile in Qatar.
The top Hamas leader in Gaza is Yehya Sinwar, who masterminded the October 7 attack.
In April, an Israeli air strike in Gaza killed three of Haniyeh’s sons and four of his grandchildren.
In an interview with the Al Jazeera satellite channel at the time, Haniyeh said the killings would not pressure Hamas into softening its positions amid ongoing ceasefire negotiations with Israel.
Meanwhile, Iraq’s Popular Mobilisation Forces, a coalition of Iranian-backed militias, said a strike on Tuesday night on a base southwest of Baghdad killed four members of the Kataib Hezbollah militia.
The group accused the United States of being behind the strike.
Kataib Hezbollah, along with some of the other militias, has in recent months carried out attacks against bases housing US troops in Iraq and Syria in retaliation for Washington’s support for Israel in the war in Gaza.
with AP
