Leaders of countries across the world have condemned the killing of Ismail Haniyeh the Hamas political chief who was killed on Tuesday by an airstrike in Tehran.
Haniyeh had been in Tehran to attend the inauguration of President Masoud Pezeshkian and Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
“With this action, the criminal and terrorist Zionist regime prepared the ground for harsh punishment for itself, and we consider it our duty to seek revenge for his blood as he was martyred in the territory of the Islamic Republic of Iran,” Khamenei said in a statement carried by the IRNA official news agency.
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Pezeshkian said that Iran “will defend its territorial integrity, honour, pride and dignity, and make the terrorist invaders regret their cowardly action.”
Palestinian Authority president Mahmud Abbas is a rival of Haniyeh but slammed the killing as “a cowardly act and a serious escalation,” his office said in a statement. “He urged our people and their forces to unite, remain patient, and stand firm against the Israeli occupation.”
Haniyeh was based in Qatar, which has been a mediator in the Gaza conflict but also spent time in Turkey after going into exile. Qatar’s foreign ministry called the killing a “heinous crime” and “shameful assassination”.
The ministry said: “This assassination and the reckless Israeli behaviour of continuously targeting civilians in Gaza will lead to the region slipping into chaos and undermine the chances of peace.”
Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey’s President condemned what he called the “perfidious assassination” of his “brother” Haniyeh.
“This shameful act aims to sabotage the Palestinian cause, the glorious Gazan resistance and our Palestinian brothers’ just fight, and to intimidate Palestinians,” Erdogan added in a social media post.
Antony Blinken, US Secretary of State said that reaching a ceasefire in the Gaza war “is the enduring imperative” after the killing of Haniyeh.
Germany stressed international calls for restraint to avoid “a regional conflagration”, with a foreign ministry spokesman saying: “The logic of tit-for-tat reprisals is the wrong path.”
Haniyeh went to Moscow in September 2022 for talks on the Israel-Palestinian conflict while Hamas and rival Palestinian faction Fatah held talks in Beijing last week.
“It is a completely unacceptable political assassination, and this will lead to a further escalation of tensions,” Russia’s Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov told the state-run RIA Novosti news agency.
Konstantin Kosachev, the vice-president of Russia’s upper house Federation Council, predicted a “sudden escalation of mutual hatred” in the Middle East.
China’s foreign ministry spokesman Lin Jian said: “We are highly concerned about the incident and firmly oppose and condemn the assassination.”
