Since Tuesday evening until early Wednesday, the Middle East witnessed two assassinations, including of senior Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr in an Israeli strike on a southern suburb of Beirut and Hamas political bureau chief Ismail Haniyeh in the Iranian capital, Tehran.
The Palestinian resistance group Hamas announced early Wednesday that Haniyeh was killed in an Israeli airstrike targeting his residence in Tehran.
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“Hamas mourns to our great Palestinian people, to the Arab and Islamic nations, and to all the free people of the world, the martyr, the Mujahid Ismail Haniyeh, the head of the movement, who was killed in a treacherous Zionist raid on his residence in Tehran after participating in the inauguration ceremony of the new Iranian president,” it said in a statement on Telegram.
However, no immediate announcement has been made by Israel on the incident.
The Israeli army also claimed Tuesday that it killed key Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr in a drone strike.
The fate of the Hezbollah leader remains shrouded in mystery following the assassination attempt late Tuesday.
There has been no comment from Hezbollah on the attack so far.
The assassinations come amid an ongoing Israeli offensive on the Gaza Strip for more than nine months, along with an escalation involving Hezbollah on the southern Lebanese border with the Israeli army.
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The assassination of Haniyeh is a “cowardly act that will not go unpunished”, the Hamas-run channel Al-Aqsa TV quoted senior Hamas official Moussa Abu Marzouk as saying.
“This assassination by the Israeli occupation of Brother Haniyeh is a grave escalation that aims to break the will of Hamas,” senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri told Reuters. He went on to say that Hamas will continue the path it is following, and is “confident of victory.”
Israel had threatened to eliminate Haniyeh and other leaders of Hamas over the group’s October, 7 attack on Israel that killed 1,200 people and saw some 250 others taken hostage. Earlier this year an Israeli air strike in central Gaza killed three sons and four grandchildren of Haniyeh. The military claimed they were involved in “terrorist activities”. Haniyeh at the time said that about 60 members of his family had been killed since October.