Hamas leader killed in Iran

Haniyeh has operated as the public face of Hamas for years. To date, he is the most senior member of the organization that has been killed by Israel. “Haniyeh is leading the political battle for Hamas with Arab governments,” Adeeb Ziadeh, an expert in Palestinian affairs at Qatar University, told Reuters before the assassination. “He is the political and diplomatic front of Hamas.” In 2006, Haniyeh was the Palestinian prime minister, and was elected to lead Hamas’ political bureau in 2017. He joined the militant organization at the time of its founding in the 1980s, but has lived in exile since 2019 and split his time between Qatar and Turkey.

Israel has repeatedly vowed to destroy Hamas in retaliation for the militant group’s Oct. 7 attack. It has targeted top Hamas leaders, and carried out a 10-month assault on Gaza. But ongoing discussions, mediated by Qatar, the US, and Egypt, have hinged on Haniyeh’s participation. “He was someone who saw the value of a deal and was instrumental to getting certain breakthroughs in the talks,” a source told CNN. “At this stage, it’s unclear what the effect will be on ceasefire talks.” Doha has raised concerns: “how can mediation succeed when one party assassinates the negotiator on the other side?” Qatar’s prime minister wrote on X.

Washington’s strikes against Iran-backed militias in Iraq, alongside Haniyeh’s assassination and Israel’s killing of a senior Hezbollah commander, have only worsened the risk of an all-out conflict, analysts say. “There is no responsible adult in Washington, or elsewhere, who is willing to put leverage on Israel and force us to go back to the negotiating table,” Israeli political analyst Akiva Eldar told Al Jazeera. The various strikes by the US and Israel are “clearly sequenced and coordinated,” Chatham House’s Middle East and North Africa program director wrote on X. “This is no coincidence and an opportunity to degrade the axis together even if it risks a broader escalation.”