Live Updates: A Top Hamas Leader Is Killed in Iran
“Hamas accused Israel of killing Ismail Haniyeh, who was in Tehran for the inauguration of Iran’s new president, though there was no response from Israel. His death raised further fears of a wider war in the region.
Pinned
Ismail Haniyeh, one of the most senior Hamas leaders, was assassinated in Iran, the country’s Revolutionary Guards Corps and Hamas said on Wednesday, a severe blow to the Palestinian group that threatens to engulf the region in further conflict.
Both Iran and Hamas accused Israel of killing Mr. Haniyeh, who led the group’s political operations from exile in Qatar. He was in Tehran to attend the inauguration of the newly elected president of Iran, Hamas’s main backer.
The Qatari prime minister, Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, appeared to accuse Israel of assassinating Haniyeh in a post on social media. “How can mediation succeed when one party assassinates the negotiator on the other side?” wrote Al Thani, one of the main mediators in the cease-fire talks between Israel and Hamas. “Peace needs serious partners & a global stance against the disregard for human life.” Israel has not commented on the assassination.
Ismail Haniyeh was the top figure managing Hamas’s international relations and one of the group’s most recognizable faces worldwide. From his base in Doha, Qatar, he helped lead Hamas in high-stakes negotiations for a cease-fire in Gaza, and he delivered fiery speeches broadcast throughout the Arab world.
But his killing in Iran, for which Tehran and Hamas blamed Israel, is unlikely to destabilize Hamas in the long term, analysts say, noting that the group has recovered from past assassinations of political and military leaders.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the United States did not know about the strike on Haniyeh ahead of time. “This is something we were not aware of or involved in,” he said when asked about the killing in an interview with Channel News Asia in Singapore. Blinken added: “One of the things that we’ve been focused on is trying to make sure that the conflict that occurred in Gaza doesn’t escalate. We’re going to continue to do that as well.”
On the way to the airport in Singapore for a flight to Mongolia, Blinken called the prime minister of Qatar, Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, to talk about the violent events in Tehran and Beirut. The prime minister has been one of the main mediators in cease-fire talks between Israel and Hamas.
The two main mediators in Gaza cease-fire talks warned Wednesday that the assassination of a top Hamas leader in Iran could plunge the Middle East even deeper into chaos by sparking a new escalation in the violence.
The Gulf nation of Qatar, one of the mediators, said that the attack could upend peace negotiations. And Egypt’s foreign ministry condemned the strike as a “dangerous escalation” and warned against “fueling conflict in the region,” suggesting that Israel was uninterested in pursuing regional calm.
Hours after Haniyeh’s death, Israeli leaders have mostly yet to comment on the Hamas leader’s assassination in Tehran. Touring Israeli air defense batteries on Wednesday, Israel’s defense minister, Yoav Gallant, said: “We don’t want war, but we are preparing for every eventuality.”
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the United States was still intent on making a cease-fire deal happen. “All I can tell you right now is nothing takes away from the importance, as I said a moment ago, of getting to the cease-fire,” Blinken said at an event in Singapore, after he was asked about Haniyeh’s death. “I’m not going to speculate on what impact any one event might have.”
A mourning procession will be held for Haniyeh in Tehran on Thursday, after which his body will be flown to Qatar, Hamas said in a statement. The formal funeral will be held in Doha on Friday, the group said.
The Qassam Brigades, Hamas’s armed wing, said in a statement that the killing of Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’s political leader, was “a dangerous event” that would have repercussions for the entire region.
Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority, announced a day of mourning for Haniyeh in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, which is partially administered by the authority. In 2007, when Haniyeh was the authority’s prime minister, Hamas expelled Abbas’s Fatah party from Gaza in a coup, and the two Palestinian factions have been bitterly at odds ever since. In a statement carried by WAFA, the official Palestinian news agency, Abbas did not mention Hamas, identifying Haniyeh solely as a former prime minister.
Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said Haniyeh’s assassination would prompt a “harsh punishment.” Khamenei added that Iran was duty-bound to avenge Haniyeh, whose killing he attributed to Israel, Iranian state news media reported.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel will convene the country’s security chiefs around noon local time, a spokesman for his office said, in the wake of Haniyeh’s killing and Israel’s targeting of a senior Hezbollah commander in Beirut on Tuesday night. Israel took responsibility for the attack in Beirut, but has not talked about Haniyeh’s death.
Relatives of Israeli hostages held in Gaza expressed uncertainty and concern about the fate of the negotiations with Hamas for a cease-fire and their release. Amit Levy, the brother of Naama Levy, who was abducted from an army base during the Hamas-led attack on Oct. 7, said on national television that he hoped the killing of Haniyeh would help secure the release of the hostages, but that he was unsure. More than a hundred hostages remain in Gaza, at least a third of whom are believed to be dead.
President Masoud Pezeshkian of Iran, a day after taking office, had strong words for Israel in his first comments about Haniyeh’s assassination, saying in a statement, “We will make the occupying terrorist regime regret its action,” Iran’s news media reported. He signaled that Iran would retaliate, saying that “Iran will defend its sovereignty, dignity, reputation and honor."
Hamas and Iran on Wednesday accused Israel of assassinating Ismail Haniyeh, one of the Palestinian militant group’s most senior figures, in Tehran.
Israel had yet to comment on the killing of Mr. Haniyeh, the political leader of one of Iran’s biggest regional allies. Iran and Israel have fought a covert war for years, blaming each other for sabotage, abductions and targeted killings across the region.
Though Israel has yet to comment officially on the killing of Ismail Haniyeh, former Israeli military officials were on national television Wednesday morning praising what appeared to be two operations targeting Hezbollah and Hamas, even as they raised questions about Israel’s longer-term strategy. In a live panel discussion on Israel’s Channel 12, Amos Gilad, a general in the reserves, called the killings in the heart of enemy territory “an amazing achievement.”
Qatar, which has sought to broker a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas, condemned Haniyeh’s killing as “an ugly crime and a dangerous escalation.” In a statement, the Qatari Foreign Ministry said that the assassination, along with Israel’s “continued targeting of civilians in Gaza” was “leading the region to slide into chaos.” Qatar has hosted senior Hamas leaders, including Haniyeh, for years, and allowed the group to maintain a political office there.
The death toll from the Israeli strike near Beirut on Tuesday has risen to four, two women and two children, according to the Lebanese Red Cross. The strike was in retaliation for a rocket attack in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights that Israel blamed on Hezbollah.
Asked about Israel’s involvement in the Hamas leader’s assassination and whether the U.S. had advance notice of it, U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin responded: “I don’t have anything for you on that.”
The secretary, aboard a Navy ship in the Philippines, said the U.S. would come to Israel’s defense if it is attacked. “We don’t want to see any of that happen,” he said, according to a video of his remarks to reporters. “We’re going to work hard to make sure that we’re doing things to help take the temperature down, and address issues through diplomatic means.”
Before Haniyeh’s death, an Israeli attack in Beirut on Tuesday dominated the news. Hezbollah is now confirming that Fuad Shukr, a senior commander, was in the building targeted by Israeli forces in Beirut. The Lebanese armed group, though, has not confirmed his death. Instead, they say rescue teams were working “diligently but slowly” to sift through the rubble.
Iranian state television blamed Israel for the death of Ismail Haniyeh, saying that it would delay a cease-fire in Gaza by several months and prompt a retaliation from Iran-backed militant groups in the region. Statements on Iranian state television carry weight because they reflect the view of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the government.
Hussein al-Sheikh, a senior official in the Palestinian Authority, the West Bank-based governing body dominated by Hamas’s main rival, Fatah, condemned Ismail Haniyeh’s killing. Sheikh, who has frequently criticized Hamas, described the death as “a cowardly act.”
Israel has yet to directly comment on the killing. But the Israeli military did issue a statement at about 8 a.m. saying that there are “no changes in the Home Front Command defensive guidelines.” The military is “conducting a situational assessment” and would update the public should there be any changes, it said.
The location of the killing, Tehran, was noteworthy. In recent years, Haniyeh’s home base has been in Qatar, a country that Israel maintains informal ties with. Since the start of the war, Israel hasn’t killed Hamas leaders in Qatar.
Iran is holding an emergency meeting of its Supreme National Security Council at the supreme leader's residence, an event that happens during extraordinary circumstances, according to two Iranian officials. The commander of the Quds forces, which oversees the network of militias aligned with Iran, is also at the meeting.
While Israel has not commented on the killing, it has in the past carried out a number of high-profile assassinations in Iran in recent years, rattling Iran’s leaders and prompting a major security overhaul including the ouster of a top security official.
The assassination of Ismail Haniyeh, one of Hamas’s most senior leaders, in Iran’s capital threatens to ratchet up tensions in the Middle East and could further imperil any prospect of a breakthrough in the already stalled negotiations to stop the war in Gaza.
Mr. Haniyeh was killed while he was in Tehran with other senior members of Iran’s “axis of resistance” — which includes Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthis in Yemen — to attend the inauguration of Iran’s newly elected president.
Live Updates: A Top Hamas Leader Is Killed in Iran
Hamas accused Israel of killing Ismail Haniyeh, who was in Tehran for the inauguration of Iran’s new president, though there was no response from Israel. His death raised further fears of a wider war in the region.
Pinned
Ismail Haniyeh, one of the most senior Hamas leaders, was assassinated in Iran, the country’s Revolutionary Guards Corps and Hamas said on Wednesday, a severe blow to the Palestinian group that threatens to engulf the region in further conflict.
Both Iran and Hamas accused Israel of killing Mr. Haniyeh, who led the group’s political operations from exile in Qatar. He was in Tehran to attend the inauguration of the newly elected president of Iran, Hamas’s main backer.
The Qatari prime minister, Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, appeared to accuse Israel of assassinating Haniyeh in a post on social media. “How can mediation succeed when one party assassinates the negotiator on the other side?” wrote Al Thani, one of the main mediators in the cease-fire talks between Israel and Hamas. “Peace needs serious partners & a global stance against the disregard for human life.” Israel has not commented on the assassination.
Ismail Haniyeh was the top figure managing Hamas’s international relations and one of the group’s most recognizable faces worldwide. From his base in Doha, Qatar, he helped lead Hamas in high-stakes negotiations for a cease-fire in Gaza, and he delivered fiery speeches broadcast throughout the Arab world.
But his killing in Iran, for which Tehran and Hamas blamed Israel, is unlikely to destabilize Hamas in the long term, analysts say, noting that the group has recovered from past assassinations of political and military leaders.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the United States did not know about the strike on Haniyeh ahead of time. “This is something we were not aware of or involved in,” he said when asked about the killing in an interview with Channel News Asia in Singapore. Blinken added: “One of the things that we’ve been focused on is trying to make sure that the conflict that occurred in Gaza doesn’t escalate. We’re going to continue to do that as well.”
On the way to the airport in Singapore for a flight to Mongolia, Blinken called the prime minister of Qatar, Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al Thani, to talk about the violent events in Tehran and Beirut. The prime minister has been one of the main mediators in cease-fire talks between Israel and Hamas.
The two main mediators in Gaza cease-fire talks warned Wednesday that the assassination of a top Hamas leader in Iran could plunge the Middle East even deeper into chaos by sparking a new escalation in the violence.
The Gulf nation of Qatar, one of the mediators, said that the attack could upend peace negotiations. And Egypt’s foreign ministry condemned the strike as a “dangerous escalation” and warned against “fueling conflict in the region,” suggesting that Israel was uninterested in pursuing regional calm.
Hours after Haniyeh’s death, Israeli leaders have mostly yet to comment on the Hamas leader’s assassination in Tehran. Touring Israeli air defense batteries on Wednesday, Israel’s defense minister, Yoav Gallant, said: “We don’t want war, but we are preparing for every eventuality.”
Secretary of State Antony Blinken said the United States was still intent on making a cease-fire deal happen. “All I can tell you right now is nothing takes away from the importance, as I said a moment ago, of getting to the cease-fire,” Blinken said at an event in Singapore, after he was asked about Haniyeh’s death. “I’m not going to speculate on what impact any one event might have.”
A mourning procession will be held for Haniyeh in Tehran on Thursday, after which his body will be flown to Qatar, Hamas said in a statement. The formal funeral will be held in Doha on Friday, the group said.
The Qassam Brigades, Hamas’s armed wing, said in a statement that the killing of Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’s political leader, was “a dangerous event” that would have repercussions for the entire region.
Mahmoud Abbas, president of the Palestinian Authority, announced a day of mourning for Haniyeh in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, which is partially administered by the authority. In 2007, when Haniyeh was the authority’s prime minister, Hamas expelled Abbas’s Fatah party from Gaza in a coup, and the two Palestinian factions have been bitterly at odds ever since. In a statement carried by WAFA, the official Palestinian news agency, Abbas did not mention Hamas, identifying Haniyeh solely as a former prime minister.
Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said Haniyeh’s assassination would prompt a “harsh punishment.” Khamenei added that Iran was duty-bound to avenge Haniyeh, whose killing he attributed to Israel, Iranian state news media reported.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel will convene the country’s security chiefs around noon local time, a spokesman for his office said, in the wake of Haniyeh’s killing and Israel’s targeting of a senior Hezbollah commander in Beirut on Tuesday night. Israel took responsibility for the attack in Beirut, but has not talked about Haniyeh’s death.
Relatives of Israeli hostages held in Gaza expressed uncertainty and concern about the fate of the negotiations with Hamas for a cease-fire and their release. Amit Levy, the brother of Naama Levy, who was abducted from an army base during the Hamas-led attack on Oct. 7, said on national television that he hoped the killing of Haniyeh would help secure the release of the hostages, but that he was unsure. More than a hundred hostages remain in Gaza, at least a third of whom are believed to be dead.
President Masoud Pezeshkian of Iran, a day after taking office, had strong words for Israel in his first comments about Haniyeh’s assassination, saying in a statement, “We will make the occupying terrorist regime regret its action,” Iran’s news media reported. He signaled that Iran would retaliate, saying that “Iran will defend its sovereignty, dignity, reputation and honor."
Hamas and Iran on Wednesday accused Israel of assassinating Ismail Haniyeh, one of the Palestinian militant group’s most senior figures, in Tehran.
Israel had yet to comment on the killing of Mr. Haniyeh, the political leader of one of Iran’s biggest regional allies. Iran and Israel have fought a covert war for years, blaming each other for sabotage, abductions and targeted killings across the region.
Though Israel has yet to comment officially on the killing of Ismail Haniyeh, former Israeli military officials were on national television Wednesday morning praising what appeared to be two operations targeting Hezbollah and Hamas, even as they raised questions about Israel’s longer-term strategy. In a live panel discussion on Israel’s Channel 12, Amos Gilad, a general in the reserves, called the killings in the heart of enemy territory “an amazing achievement.”
Qatar, which has sought to broker a cease-fire between Israel and Hamas, condemned Haniyeh’s killing as “an ugly crime and a dangerous escalation.” In a statement, the Qatari Foreign Ministry said that the assassination, along with Israel’s “continued targeting of civilians in Gaza” was “leading the region to slide into chaos.” Qatar has hosted senior Hamas leaders, including Haniyeh, for years, and allowed the group to maintain a political office there.
The death toll from the Israeli strike near Beirut on Tuesday has risen to four, two women and two children, according to the Lebanese Red Cross. The strike was in retaliation for a rocket attack in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights that Israel blamed on Hezbollah.
Asked about Israel’s involvement in the Hamas leader’s assassination and whether the U.S. had advance notice of it, U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin responded: “I don’t have anything for you on that.”
The secretary, aboard a Navy ship in the Philippines, said the U.S. would come to Israel’s defense if it is attacked. “We don’t want to see any of that happen,” he said, according to a video of his remarks to reporters. “We’re going to work hard to make sure that we’re doing things to help take the temperature down, and address issues through diplomatic means.”
Before Haniyeh’s death, an Israeli attack in Beirut on Tuesday dominated the news. Hezbollah is now confirming that Fuad Shukr, a senior commander, was in the building targeted by Israeli forces in Beirut. The Lebanese armed group, though, has not confirmed his death. Instead, they say rescue teams were working “diligently but slowly” to sift through the rubble.
Iranian state television blamed Israel for the death of Ismail Haniyeh, saying that it would delay a cease-fire in Gaza by several months and prompt a retaliation from Iran-backed militant groups in the region. Statements on Iranian state television carry weight because they reflect the view of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and the government.
Hussein al-Sheikh, a senior official in the Palestinian Authority, the West Bank-based governing body dominated by Hamas’s main rival, Fatah, condemned Ismail Haniyeh’s killing. Sheikh, who has frequently criticized Hamas, described the death as “a cowardly act.”
Israel has yet to directly comment on the killing. But the Israeli military did issue a statement at about 8 a.m. saying that there are “no changes in the Home Front Command defensive guidelines.” The military is “conducting a situational assessment” and would update the public should there be any changes, it said.
The location of the killing, Tehran, was noteworthy. In recent years, Haniyeh’s home base has been in Qatar, a country that Israel maintains informal ties with. Since the start of the war, Israel hasn’t killed Hamas leaders in Qatar.
Iran is holding an emergency meeting of its Supreme National Security Council at the supreme leader's residence, an event that happens during extraordinary circumstances, according to two Iranian officials. The commander of the Quds forces, which oversees the network of militias aligned with Iran, is also at the meeting.
While Israel has not commented on the killing, it has in the past carried out a number of high-profile assassinations in Iran in recent years, rattling Iran’s leaders and prompting a major security overhaul including the ouster of a top security official.
The assassination of Ismail Haniyeh, one of Hamas’s most senior leaders, in Iran’s capital threatens to ratchet up tensions in the Middle East and could further imperil any prospect of a breakthrough in the already stalled negotiations to stop the war in Gaza.
Mr. Haniyeh was killed while he was in Tehran with other senior members of Iran’s “axis of resistance” — which includes Hamas in Gaza, Hezbollah in Lebanon and the Houthis in Yemen — to attend the inauguration of Iran’s newly elected president.“
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