Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said in a statement that Ismail Haniyeh, a Hamas chief, was killed while attending the inauguration ceremony of Iran’s new president, MailOnline reports.
Their statement said that Haniyeh had been killed alongside a security guard in a targeted attack at their place of residence.
Haniyeh, the head of Hamas’ political bureau, had been in the capital city as Masoud Pezeshkian was sworn in as President of the nation.
In a statement, Hamas blamed Israeli forces on the death of Haniyeh as they announced his death ‘to the Palestinian people and the Arab nation’.
Hamas officials have also now made it clear that the death of Haniyeh will not ‘pass in vein’, while adding they were ‘ready to pay various prices’.
Musa Abu Marzouk, a member of the group’s political bureau, told CNN that the killing of Haniyeh ‘will not pass in vein’.
Marzouk said: ‘The assassination of leader Ismail Haniyeh was a cowardly act and will not pass in vain.’
While Sami Abu Zuhri, another Hamas official, added: ‘We are engaged in an open war to liberate Jerusalem and we are ready to pay various prices.’
In response to the claim made by the group that his death was the result of an Israeli raid, the Israeli military said it ‘doesn’t respond to reports in the foreign media’.
Meanwhile, there was no immediate reaction from the White House on the death of Haniyeh.
Iran planned to hold an emergency meeting of its Supreme National Security Council, according to The New York Times.
Israel had 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.
