Two people with knowledge of the situation confirmed to Axios that the Israeli Mossad killed Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh by detonating an explosive device that had been planted in his bedroom at the official residence of the Iranian government in Tehran.
Why it matters: The Mossad’s ability to plant the explosive device in a high-security facility demonstrates not only the Israeli intelligence services’ extensive penetration of Iran but also the vulnerabilities of the Iranian security and intelligence apparatus.
The insights regarding the established unstable gadget were first detailed by the New York Times and affirmed to Axios by two sources. The explosion that killed Haniyeh happened on Tuesday night, but the official announcement of his death was published on Wednesday morning, several hours later.
Haniyeh was killed in an Israeli airstrike, Hamas claimed in its initial statement. Iranian media initially revealed three rockets were sent off by a robot and later that the rocket was sent off from beyond Iran. Behind the scenes: According to the sources, Israeli intelligence discovered which facility Haniyeh visited in Tehran and which room he stayed in.
According to the sources, the room had the bomb set up in advance.
They went on to say that the bomb was an advanced artificial intelligence-powered device. After receiving information that Haniyeh was in the room, Mossad agents on Iranian soil detonated it remotely. The incident has been the subject of an investigation, according to the IRGC.
The United States or any other ally were not informed in advance of the assassination by Israel. However, sources claimed that Israeli officials briefed their American counterparts on the operation’s specifics on Wednesday evening.
The higher perspective: Israeli Head of the state Benjamin Netanyahu, who is straightforwardly responsible for the Mossad, went with the choice to kill Haniyeh.
According to the sources, the decision-making process took into account the negotiations to reach a deal to free the hostages held by Hamas in Gaza and establish a ceasefire. According to one of the sources, the Mossad’s position was that Haniyeh’s assassination would end the hostage deal and bring justice to the Oct. 7 attack victims.
Haniyeh was making it harder to reach a deal because he held a more rigid perspective on the agreement than Yahya Sinwar, the leader of Hamas in Gaza.
