Hamas’ top political leader has been killed in an attack in the Iranian capital of Tehran, according to the Palestinian movement and Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).
The IRGC’s press office reported that Hamas Political Bureau chief Ismail Haniyeh was slain alongside his bodyguard at his residence early Wednesday, local time, after attending the swearing-in ceremony of newly elected Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian on Tuesday. The IRGC said that the cause and circumstances of the incident remain under investigation.
The news was later confirmed by Hamas’ press office, which reported that Haniyeh “was killed in a treacherous Zionist raid” at his residence in Tehran. Hamas Political Bureau member Moussa Abu Marzouq was cited by various media outlets as calling the killing “a cowardly act” that “will not go unanswered.”
No entity immediately claimed responsibility for the assassination. Reached for comment, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) told Newsweek, “We do not comment on those reports.”
The attack comes just a day after Israel claimed the killing of a senior Hezbollah commander, Fouad Shukr, in the Lebanese capital of Beirut in response to a deadly attack on an Israel-occupied town that was blamed on the Lebanese movement. Both actions mark the latest escalations in the deepening crisis that has gripped the Middle East since the Hamas-led attack on Israel last October sparked the deadliest and longest-ever war in the Gaza Strip.
Newsweek has also reached out to Hamas and the Iranian Mission to the United Nations for comment.
Ismail Haniyeh, the Doha-based political bureau chief of the Palestinian Islamist movement Hamas, speaks to the press after a meeting with the Iranian foreign minister in Tehran on March 26. Haniyeh has reportedly been killed…
AFP/Getty Images
Haniyeh, 62, first joined Hamas during the group’s formation as a splinter of the Muslim Brotherhood in the 1980s, amid Israel’s decades long occupation of Gaza. He participated in the First Intifada uprising, was arrested by Israeli authorities and later released in 1992, after which he began to rise the ranks of the increasingly influential and violent Islamist group.
Haniyeh’s position was bolstered during the Second Intifada of the early 2000s and he went on to briefly serve as prime minister of the Palestinian National Authority (PA) under still-serving President Mahmoud Abbas in 2006. Hamas’ success in Palestinian legislative elections that year, however, led to a violent rift between Hamas and Abbas’ left-wing Fatah party and Hamas ultimately seizing control of Gaza the following year.
Haniyeh was promoted as the Hamas’ leader in Gaza in 2014, replacing Khaled Meshal, who went on to serve as the group’s political chief based in the Qatari capital of Doha. In 2017, Haniyeh again succeeded Meshal to become the head of the Hamas Political Bureau, becoming the most visible face of the group and regularly engaging in international diplomacy prior to and during the ongoing war in Gaza.
In April, three of Haniyeh’s sons were killed, reportedly alongside four of his grandchildren, in an Israeli strike in central Gaza.
Haniyeh’s killing could mark the most serious disruption yet to Hamas’ hierarchy after suffering a number of high-profile casualties throughout the conflict. Israel has claimed the killing of a number of senior Hamas officials, most notably Haniyeh’s deputy, Saleh al-Arouri, in a January airstrike in Beirut and the second-in-command of the group’s Al-Qassam Brigades military wing, Marwan Issa, in a raid in central Gaza in March.
Israeli forces also said they targeted the group’s top military leader, Al-Qassam Brigades commander Mohammed Deif, earlier this month, though neither the IDF nor Hamas have given confirmation of his fate.
Haniyeh’s successor in Gaza, Yahya Sinwar, is believed to still be alive and operating within the war-torn territory. He was last purported to be seen in footage shared by the IDF in February that appeared to show Sinwar and family members in one of Gaza’s many underground tunnels in the early days of the current war.
That same month, as the IDF vowed to pursue Sinwar and other Hamas leaders, a senior Hamas official told Newsweek that, “assassinations may temporarily affect the course of the battle, but there are a number of alternative leaders capable of managing the battle with the same efficiency.”
Haniyeh’s views regarding the deaths of the group leaders were expressed in a quote attributed to him and shared by Hamas’ press office following news of his assassination.
“A movement whose leaders and founders were martyred for the sake of the dignity of our people and our nation will never be defeated,” Haniyeh was cited as saying. “These attacks only increase its strength, resilience and unwavering determination. This is the history of the resistance and the movement. After the assassination of its leaders, it becomes stronger and more determined.”
Then-Palestinian Prime Minister Ismail Haniya speaks in Gaza city during Friday noon prayers on April 14, 2006.
Mahmoud Hams/AFP/Getty Images
Hamas has indeed refilled the ranks of many of its leaders killed in past Israeli operations, with figures such as Deif assuming top positions after the killing of their predecessors.
Just hours before Haniyeh was declared dead, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant stated that Shukr’s killing in the Hezbollah stronghold of southern Beirut demonstrated that “there is no place out of reach for our forces.”
The second killing of a senior Israeli foe in less than a day now marks yet another potential flashpoint as the conflict in Gaza continues to ramp up regional tensions. Iran has long accused Israel of conducting covert operations within the territory of the Islamic Republic, including acts of sabotage and the assassination of scientists involved in the country’s nuclear program.
In April, Iran and Israel engaged in their first-ever direct exchange of attacks with its longtime foe after the killing of senior Iranian military officials in an Israeli airstrike against an Iranian consular building in Syria.
Haniyeh’s death could also mark another blow to oft-stalled negotiations toward a Gaza ceasefire and prisoner swap plan promoted by U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration.
The killing drew a furious reaction among other Palestinian factions allied with Hamas in the fight against Israeli forces in Gaza. One such group, Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which commands the Al-Quds Brigades, warned that “the sinful assassination carried out by the criminal enemy against a symbol of the resistance will not deter our people from continuing the resistance.”
Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Nasser Kanaani also mourned Haniyeh’s death and asserted that his killing in Tehran “will strengthen the deep and unbreakable bond between Iran, dear Palestine and the resistance.”
Following news of Haniyeh’s demise, the IDF reported on the interception of a “suspicious aerial target that approached from Lebanon toward Israeli territory” as concerns continue to mount over the prospect of a major confrontation between Israel and Hezbollah.
Amid the precarious security situation surrounding the recent killings of senior Hamas and Hezbollah officials, the IDF said in a statement that it “is currently conducting a situational assessment,” though currently “there are no changes in the Home Front Command defensive guidelines.”
Palestinian leader Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas on Tuesday is pictured at the parliament in Tehran. Haniyeh was killed in the Iranian capital, according to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.
Update 07/31/2024 1:55 a.m. ET: This article was updated with more information. » …
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