The funeral of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh took place in Qatar on Friday following his assassination two days ago in Iran’s capital Tehran – one in a series of killings of senior figures in the Palestinian militant group as the war between Israel and Hamas in Gaza continues.
Mourners at the ceremony in a large mosque just north of the capital Doha included Khaled Meshaal, who is tipped to be the new Hamas leader. Other senior Hamas officials and Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani also attended.
He will be buried in a cemetery in the city of Lusail, north of Doha.
Haniyeh’s coffin, draped in the Palestinian flag, was carried across the mosque past hundreds of people along with the coffin of his bodyguard, who was killed in the same attack in Tehran on Wednesday.
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Speaking at the mosque, where Haniyeh’s body was laid for prayers, Meshaal said his death would only make the group more determined to continue its fight for a free Palestine. There would be no concessions over its principles and no recognition of Israel, he said.
Senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri spoke to Reuters by phone as he attended the funeral: “Our message to the occupation [Israel] today is that you are sinking deep in the mud and your end is getting closer than ever. The blood of Haniyeh will change all equations.”
Haniyeh was killed by a missile that hit him directly in a state guest house in Tehran where he was staying, senior Hamas official Khalil Al-Hayya told a news conference, quoting witnesses who were with him.
Iran and Hamas have both accused Israel of carrying out the killing and have pledged to retaliate. Israel has not claimed responsibility for the death nor denied it.
The strike was one of several that have killed senior figures in Hamas or the Lebanese movement Hizbullah, fuelling concern that the war in Gaza between Israel and Palestinian militants is turning into a regional conflict stretching from the Red Sea to the Lebanon-Israel border and beyond.
In the United States, President Joe Biden said Haniyeh’s killing was not helpful to international efforts to secure a ceasefire in the war in Gaza, now in its 10th month.
“It doesn’t help,” Mr Biden told reporters on Thursday, when asked if the action ruined the chances of a truce.
Qatar has been leading the peace effort along with Egypt and the US, Israel’s main ally.
The latest conflict in Gaza began on October 7th, when Hamas-led militants killed 1,200 people during an incursion into Israel and took more than 250 hostages back to Gaza, according to Israeli tallies.
Israel has since struck Gaza with air and artillery barrages and a ground offensive that have killed more than 39,400 people and turned much of the territory into piles of crushed cement and twisted metal.
Haniyeh had been the face of Hamas’s international diplomacy and had taken part in the indirect ceasefire talks.
He was seen by many diplomats as a moderate compared with the more hardline members of the Iran-backed group inside Gaza, although some Israeli commentators have said he was considered by some on the Israeli side as an obstacle to a deal.
In May, the International Criminal Court prosecutor’s office requested arrest warrants for three Hamas leaders, including Haniyeh, as well as Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu for alleged war crimes. Israel and Palestinian leaders have dismissed the allegations.
While Israel has not said it carried out the killing of Haniyeh, it has announced that an air strike it mounted last month killed the elusive Hamas military leader Mohammed Deif in Gaza. Hamas has neither confirmed nor denied the death of Deif.
Hizbullah confirmed on Wednesday that its senior military commander Fuad Shukr had been killed in an Israeli strike on a building in Beirut. – Reuters