CAIRO (Reuters) - Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh was assassinated in the early hours of Wednesday in Iran, the Palestinian group said, drawing fears of wider escalation in a region shaken by Israel's war in Gaza and a worsening conflict in Lebanon.
The Islamist faction mourned the death of Haniyeh, who it said was killed in "a treacherous Zionist raid on his residence in Tehran".
Iran's Revolutionary Guards confirmed the death of Haniyeh, hours after he attended a swearing in ceremony for the country's new president, and said it was investigating.
Iran’s Fars news agency, close to the Revolutionary Guard, posted on X that Haniyeh was stationed in the north of Tehran, and a projectile from the air killed him around 2:30 am. Further investigations are underway and details will be announced later, Fars added.
Iran's top security body is expected to meet to decide Iran's strategy in reaction to the death of Haniyeh, a close ally of Tehran, said a source with knowledge of the meeting.
IRAN CONDOLES
Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Nasser Kanaani, expressed condolences on the death of Haniyeh and said his blood will never be wasted.
Kanaani said on his Telegram channel that the killing is under investigation by the relevant institutions in Iran.
“Undoubtedly, the pure blood of this brave warrior, who spent his life in an honorable fight against the Zionist usurping regime and on the way to the liberation of Holy Quds and the liberation of the oppressed Palestinian nation from the clutches of the Zionist occupation, will never be wasted.”
There was no immediate comment from Israel. The Israeli military said it was conducting a situational assessment but had not issued any new security guidelines for civilians.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin said Washington would work to try to ease tensions but said the United States would help defend Israel if it were attacked.
Haniyeh was born in the al-Shati refugee camp in the Egyptian-occupied Gaza Strip in 1962. He studied at the Islamic University of Gaza and got a bachelor's degree in Arabic literature in 1987.
He was first became involved with Hamas during his studies.
Appointed to head a Hamas office in 1997, he subsequently grew in the ranks of the organisation.
He was the chairman of the Hamas Political Bureau. He had been residing in Qatar since 2023 until his death.
The news, which came less than 24 hours after Israel claimed to have killed the Hezbollah commander it said was behind a deadly strike in the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights, appears to set back chances of any imminent ceasefire agreement in Gaza.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas condemned the killing of Haniyeh and Palestinian factions in the occupied West Bank called for a general strike and mass demonstrations.
He also called on Palestinians to unite and be patient and steadfast in the face of Israeli occupation.
"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 said Hamas would continue the path it was following, adding: "We are confident of victory."
Haniyeh, normally based in Qatar, has been the face of the Palestinian group's international diplomacy as the war set off by the Hamas-led attack on Israel on Oct. 7 has raged in Gaza, where three of his sons were killed in an Israeli airstrike.
Appointed to the Hamas top job in 2017, Haniyeh has moved between Turkey and Qatar's capital Doha, escaping the travel curbs of the blockaded Gaza Strip and enabling him to act as a negotiator in ceasefire talks or to talk to Hamas' ally Iran.
AP adds: Israel has vowed to kill Haniyeh and other leaders of Hamas over the group’s Oct. 7 attack on Israel that killed 1,200 people and saw some 250 others taken hostage.
An Israeli military spokesman did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Israel often doesn’t when it comes to assassinations carried out by their Mossad intelligence agency.
Hamas said Haniyeh was killed “in a Zionist airstrike on his residence in Tehran after he participated in the inauguration of Iran’s new president.”
“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,” the terse statement said.
In another statement, the group quoted Haniyeh as saying that the Palestinian cause has “costs” and “we are ready for these costs: martyrdom for the sake of Palestine, and for the sake of God Almighty, and for the sake of the dignity of this nation.”
Hamas officials did not immediately respond to requests for further comment.
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 Oct. 7 attack.
Analysts on Iranian state television immediately began blaming Israel for the attack.
There was no immediate reaction from the White House. The apparent assassination comes at a precarious time, as the Biden administration has tried to push Hamas and Israel to agree to at least a temporary cease-fire and hostage-release deal.
CIA Director Bill Burns was in Rome on Sunday to meet with senior Israel, Qatari and Egyptian officials in the latest round of talks. Separately, Brett McGurk, the White House Coordinator for the Middle East and North Africa, is in the region for talks with US partners.
Israel is suspected of running a yearslong assassination campaign targeting Iranian nuclear scientists and others associated with its atomic program. In 2020, a top Iranian military nuclear scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, was killed by a remote-controlled machine gun while traveling in a car outside Tehran.
In Israel’s war against Hamas since the October attack, more than 39,360 Palestinians have been killed and more than 90,900 wounded, according to the Gaza Health Ministry, whose count does not differentiate between civilians and combatants.