Hamas yesterday said its political leader Ismail Haniyeh was killed in an Israeli strike in Iran, where he was attending the swearing-in of the new Iranian president, and vowed the act “will not go unanswered.”
Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei threatened “harsh punishment” for Haniyeh’s killing, saying: “We consider it our duty to seek revenge for his blood as he was martyred in the territory of the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian in a statement later said: “The Zionists will soon see the consequences of their cowardly and terrorist act.”
Photo: AP
“Such measures are a sign that the policies of the Zionist regime have reached a dead end,” he added.
Israel declined to comment on the Tehran strike, which came after it struck a Hezbollah stronghold in south Beirut on Tuesday, targeting a senior commander of the Lebanese militant group it blamed for a deadly weekend rocket strike on the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights.
Qatar, which has been spearheading efforts with Egypt and the US to broker a ceasefire in Gaza, said the killing of Haniyeh, Hamas’ lead negotiator, threw the whole process into doubt.
“Brother leader, mujahid Ismail Haniyeh, the head of the movement, died in a Zionist strike on his residence in Tehran after he participated in the inauguration of the new [Iranian] president,” the Palestinian militant group said in a statement.
Hamas political bureau member Musa Abu Marzuk vowed the group would retaliate.
“The assassination of leader Ismail Haniyeh is a cowardly act and will not go unanswered,” he said.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guards also announced the death, saying Haniyeh’s residence in Tehran was hit and he was killed along with a bodyguard.
Iranian media said the 2am strike targeted “the special residences for war veterans in north Tehran” where Haniyeh was staying.
Haniyeh had traveled to Tehran to attend Tuesday’s swearing-in of Pezeshkian.
The Iranian government declared three days of national mourning following the news of the killing.
An “official and public” funeral ceremony for Haniyeh would be held in Tehran today before his body is flown to Qatar, his base in recent years, for burial tomorrow, Hamas said.
Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas condemned Haniyeh’s killing as a “cowardly act.”
Palestinian factions in the Israeli-occupied West Bank called for a general strike and protest marches across the territory.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to destroy Hamas in retaliation for its Oct. 7 attacks on Israel last year, which sparked the war in Gaza.
The attacks resulted in the deaths of 1,197 people, mostly civilians, according to an Agence France-Presse tally based on official Israeli figures.
Militants also seized 251 hostages, 111 of whom are still held captive in Gaza, including 39 the military says are dead.
Israel’s retaliatory campaign against Hamas has killed at least 39,445 people in Gaza, according to the Hamas-run territory’s health ministry, which does not provide details on civilian and militant deaths.
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
China's military today said it began joint army, navy and rocket force exercises around Taiwan to "serve as a stern warning and powerful deterrent against Taiwanese independence," calling President William Lai (賴清德) a "parasite." The exercises come after Lai called Beijing a "foreign hostile force" last month. More than 10 Chinese military ships approached close to Taiwan's 24 nautical mile (44.4km) contiguous zone this morning and Taiwan sent its own warships to respond, two senior Taiwanese officials said. Taiwan has not yet detected any live fire by the Chinese military so far, one of the officials said. The drills took place after US Secretary
THUGGISH BEHAVIOR: Encouraging people to report independence supporters is another intimidation tactic that threatens cross-strait peace, the state department said China setting up an online system for reporting “Taiwanese independence” advocates is an “irresponsible and reprehensible” act, a US government spokesperson said on Friday. “China’s call for private individuals to report on alleged ‘persecution or suppression’ by supposed ‘Taiwan independence henchmen and accomplices’ is irresponsible and reprehensible,” an unnamed US Department of State spokesperson told the Central News Agency in an e-mail. The move is part of Beijing’s “intimidation campaign” against Taiwan and its supporters, and is “threatening free speech around the world, destabilizing the Indo-Pacific region, and deliberately eroding the cross-strait status quo,” the spokesperson said. The Chinese Communist Party’s “threats