Top Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh was buried in Qatar on Friday (2) after his assassination in the Iranian capital Tehran, as senior officials in the Palestinian group said its fight against Israel would intensify.
His death was one of a series of assassinations of senior Hamas figures as the Gaza war between Hamas and Israel approaches its 11th month and concerns grow that the conflict is spreading across the Middle East.
Hamas and Iran have accused Israel of carrying out Haniyeh’s assassination and have vowed to retaliate. Israel has neither claimed responsibility for the killing nor denied it.
Haniyeh was buried in a cemetery in the city of Lusail after a funeral ceremony at the Iman Mohamed Ibn Abd Al-Wahhab mosque in the Qatari capital Doha.
His coffin, draped in the Palestinian flag, was carried in a procession by hundreds of mourners along with the coffin of his bodyguard, who was killed in the same attack in Tehran on Wednesday (31).
Attendees at the ceremony included Khaled Meshaal, who is tipped to be the new leader of Hamas. Other senior Hamas officials and Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani were also in attendance.
A senior Hamas official, Sami Abu Zuhri, told Reuters by telephone: “Our message to the occupation (Israel) today is that you are sinking deep into the mud and your end is getting closer and closer. Haniyeh’s blood will change all the equations.”
Khaled Suleiman, who was among those present at the mosque, told Reuters: “Today we came…to affirm that the resistance will not end with the martyrdom of the leader, and behind the leader comes a new leader.”
“God willing, we will all continue and we are all on the path to the liberation of Al-Aqsa Mosque (in Jerusalem), Palestine and Gaza, God willing.”
The attack was one of several recent strikes that have killed senior figures from Hamas or the Lebanese Hezbollah movement in a conflict that now stretches from Gaza to the Red Sea and the Lebanon-Israel border.
In the United States, President Joe Biden said Haniyeh’s death did not help international efforts to secure a ceasefire in the war in Gaza.
“It doesn’t help,” Biden told reporters Thursday when asked if the move had ruined chances for a truce.
Qatar has been leading the peace effort alongside Egypt and the United States, Israel’s main ally.
Source: CNN Brasil

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