JERUSALEM: Israel Katz, the minister of defense, admitted Monday that Israel had killed former Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran earlier this year and threatened to “decapitate” the Houthi leadership in Yemen.
“We will strike hard at the Houthis… and decapitate their leadership — just as we did with Haniyeh, [Yahya] Sinwar, and [Hassan] Nasrallah in Tehran, Gaza, and Lebanon, we will do so in Hodeida and Sanaa,” Katz said at a defense ministry event.
This is the first time that Israel has publicly acknowledged that it was responsible for Haniyeh’s killing in the Iranian capital in late July, the day after he attended Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian’s inauguration.
Katz stated in a ministry statement that “anyone who raises a hand against Israel will have his hand cut off, and the long arm of the IDF (Israeli military) will strike him and hold him accountable.”
This is the first time an Israeli official has acknowledged that Tel Aviv was involved in the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh on Iranian land, even though Tel Aviv acknowledged the strikes that targeted Sinwar and Nasrallah.
In October, tensions between the two regional archrivals came to a head when Iran launched what it described as a barrage of missiles at targets within Israel. Although Israel claimed it destroyed most of the projectiles before they impacted, a number of missiles did hit various areas across the country, although no widespread loss of life was reported.
Tehran had claimed at the time that the attack was a response to the assassination of Hassan Nasrallah, IRGC commander Abbas Nilforoushan, as well as the killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran in July.
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