Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz admitted Monday for the first time publicly that Israel killed Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Iran in July, further raising tensions between Tehran and arch-foe Israel in a region rocked by Israel's war in Gaza and the conflict in Lebanon.
He said Israel defeated Hamas and Hezbollah, “blinded” Iran's defense systems and damaged its production systems. He also said the country had toppled the Assad regime in Syria, dealing a serious blow to what he called the “axis of evil.”
“We will also deal a serious blow to the Houthi terrorist organization in Yemen, which remains the last survivor.”
Israel “will destroy its strategic infrastructure, and we will behead their leaders – as we did to Haniyeh, Sinwar and Nasrallah in Tehran, Gaza and Lebanon – we will do it in Hodeidah and Sanaa,” Katz said during an evening honoring Defense Ministry employees.
An Iran-backed group in Yemen has been attacking merchant ships in the Red Sea for more than a year in an attempt to force a naval blockade on Israel, claiming it is acting in solidarity with Palestinians during Israel's year-long war in Gaza.
At the end of July, the political leader of the Palestinian Islamist group Hamas was killed in Tehran in an attack for which the Iranian authorities blamed Israel. At the time, Israel did not directly claim responsibility for Haniya's killing.
Haniyeh, usually based in Qatar, was the face of Hamas's international diplomacy as war raged in Gaza over the group's attack on Israel on October 7, 2023. He participated in internationally negotiated indirect talks to achieve a ceasefire in the Palestinian enclave.
A few months later, Israeli forces in Gaza killed Yahya Sinwar, Haniyeh's successor and mastermind of the October 7 attack.
Earlier this month, Syrian rebels overthrew the Assad regime. Last week, Israeli forces entered part of Syria's territory that is supposed to be a demilitarized zone, sparking accusations that the country is taking advantage of the chaos in the region to grab land.