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Hamas has said its political leader Ismail Haniyeh was killed in an Israeli strike in Iran early on Wednesday, an attack that dramatically raises the risk of a further escalation of regional hostilities.
The Palestinian militant group said in a statement that Haniyeh, who lived in exile, died after a “treacherous Zionist” attack on his residence in Tehran. Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards confirmed that Haniyeh was killed in an attack in the Iranian capital but did not provide further details.
The killing of Haniyeh came hours after Israel said it had killed a senior Hizbollah commander in an air strike on Beirut, the Lebanese capital, heightening fears that the region was sliding towards a full-blown war.
Israel did not immediately comment on Haniyeh’s death and typically neither confirms or denies assassination attempts on foreign soil. Israeli officials have previously said they would hold all Hamas leaders accountable for the group’s October 7 attack on southern Israel.
The Hamas leader, believed to be in his 60s, had been living in exile in Qatar but often travelled to Iran, which supports Hamas as part of its so-called axis of resistance. Haniyeh had attended the inauguration of Iran’s new president Masoud Pezeshkian on Tuesday and met him earlier in the day.
Haniyeh, who has been Hamas’s political leader since 2017, is the highest-profile member of Hamas to be killed since the militant group’s October attack and since Israel’s retaliatory offensive in Gaza triggered a wave of regional hostilities. He was the main interlocutor for mediators trying to negotiate a ceasefire in Gaza and the release of Israeli hostages held in the strip.
His killing in Tehran will mark a huge embarrassment for Iran and risk the regime retaliating against Israel. Tensions in the region had already soared after Israel said it had killed Fuad Shukr, a senior Hizbollah commander, in an air strike on a residential building in southern Beirut on Tuesday.
The Israel Defense Forces described Shukr as Hizbollah’s most senior military commander and right-hand man to Hassan Nasrallah, leader of the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group.
Hizbollah has not made an official comment about the Israeli strike, but it was the first Israeli attack targeting one of the group’s leaders in Beirut since October 7. It came in retaliation for Saturday’s rocket strike in the occupied Golan Heights, which killed 12 young people on a football pitch.
Israel blamed Hizbollah for that attack, the deadliest incident for civilians in Israeli-controlled territory since Israel and the Lebanese militant group started exchanging almost daily fire nearly 10 months ago.
Lebanon’s state-run National News Agency said the Israeli strike on Beirut on Tuesday, carried out with a drone that launched three rockets, had targeted the area around Hizbollah’s governing Shura Council in the densely populated Haret Hreik neighbourhood, a stronghold of the militant group.
A large explosion ripped through the area, with television footage showing several floors of a residential building badly damaged and large plumes of smoke. At least three people were killed — a woman and two children — and a further 74 people were injured, some critically, the Lebanese health ministry said.
Hizbollah, considered one of the world’s most heavily armed non-state actors, has previously warned Israel against “any assassination on Lebanese soil against a Lebanese, Syrian, Iranian or Palestinian”, suggesting the Israeli strike would be met with a decisive response.
“The Israeli enemy has committed a great stupid act in size, timing and circumstances by targeting an entirely civilian area,” Hizbollah official Ali Ammar told the group’s Al-Manar TV following the Israeli strike. “The Israeli enemy will pay a price for this sooner or later.”
There will also be concerns about how Iran, which considers Hizbollah its most important proxy, will respond, particularly if it is confirmed that Israel conducted the strike in Tehran that killed Haniyeh.
The US has been leading a flurry of diplomatic efforts to de-escalate tensions between Israel and Hizbollah since the rocket attack on the Golan Heights.
UK foreign secretary David Lammy said on Tuesday that the risk of further escalation “and regional destabilisation is now more acute than ever”.
“A widening of this conflict is in nobody’s interest,” Lammy said in a statement to parliament. “Indeed, the consequences could be catastrophic. That is why we continue to press for a diplomatic solution.”
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