Iran claims amid Israel-Hamas war: ‘Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh killed in Tehran’

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards (IRG) on August 3 said that Ismail Haniyeh, a leader of the Palestinian militant group Hamas, was killed in Tehran by a short-range projectile with a warhead of about 7 kg, and vowed severe revenge, Reuters reported.

Haniyeh’s assassination has drawn fears of direct conflict between Tehran and its arch-enemy Israel in a region shaken by Israel’s war in Gaza and a worsening conflict in Lebanon.

“Based on investigations and analyses conducted, this terrorist operation was carried out with the firing of a short-range projectile equipped with a warhead weighing approximately 7 kg, accompanied by a powerful explosion, from outside the vicinity of the guests’ residence,” the IRG said in a statement.

Revenge for the killing of the Hamas leader will be “severe and at an appropriate time, place, and manner,” the Guards added, blaming the “terrorist Zionist regime” of Israel for his death.

Haniyeh, who led Hamas’s political operations from exile in Qatar, was killed after his residence was targeted in Tehran at 2 am on July 31.

Iran and Hamas have accused Israel of carrying out the strike that killed Haniyeh hours after he attended the inauguration of Iran’s new president.

Iran has arrested more than two dozen individuals, including senior intelligence officers, military officials, and staff from a military-run guesthouse, following the massive security breach in Tehran that led to the assassination of Hamas chief Ismail Haniyeh.

The Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC), which specialises in intelligence and espionage, has taken charge of the investigation.

The IRGC has conducted extensive raids, quarantining guesthouse staff, confiscating electronic devices, and interrogating military and intelligence officials. In addition to the guesthouse raid, Iranian agents have been scrutinising surveillance footage from airports and guest lists, believing that members of the assassin team may still be within Iran.

Meanwhile, the United States and Israel are preparing for a retaliatory attack from Iran and its allies this weekend itself.

The United States has decided to move a fighter jet squadron to the Middle East and maintain an aircraft carrier in the region beefing up the American military presence to help defend Israel from possible attacks by Iran and its proxies and safeguard US troops.

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has also ordered additional ballistic missile defense-capable cruisers and destroyers to the European and Middle East regions and is taking steps to send more land-based ballistic missile defense weapons there, AP reported.

Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has ordered Iran to strike Israel directly, in retaliation for the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran.

Khamenei gave the order at an emergency meeting of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council on July 31 shortly after Iran announced that Haniyeh had been killed.