Israel claims responsibility for assassination of senior Hezbollah military commander: Hamas political leader is killed in Iran

The situation in the Middle East was shaken on Tuesday when Israel announced that it had killed Fuad Shukr, Hezbollah's most senior military commander, with an attack on a headquarters building in a suburb of Beirut, Lebanon. In a separate incident, Iran announced that Ismail Haniyeh, the head of Hamas's political wing, was killed in Iran.

Iran describes Haniyeh's killed as "an assassination." Hamas and Iran are both blaming Israel. The Israeli Defense Forces declined to comment on Haniyeh's death.

These attacks follow a rocket attack by Hezbollah that killed 14 children and teenagers at a soccer match in a Druze village in Israel.

Hezbollah acknowledges that Shukr was "in the building" but said that they will not know Shukr's fate until they get through removing the rubble.

Shukr was Hezbollah leader Hasan Nasrallah's "adviser for planning and directing wartime operation," directing the group's attacks against Israel during the war in Gaza.

Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has said that it is Iran's "duty" to avenge the killing of Haniyeh. Hamas's armed wing, the Izzedine al-Qassam Brigades has vowed to seek revenge.

Haniyeh was based in Qatar. He was in Tehran to attend the inauguration of the country's new president, Masoud Pezeshkian. How he was killed has not yet been reported.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that Israel did not warn the U.S. that they were going to kill Haniyeh. Blinken said that the U.S. was not involved in the slaying.

"This is something we were not aware of or involved in," Blinken told Channel News Asia in an interview in Singapore.

Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati condemned both Israel's attack Tuesday on Hezbollah in Lebanon and the killing of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Iran.

"The best way to bring the temperature down everywhere is through the cease-fire in Gaza," Mikati said. "That's why the focus on the cease-fire needs to remain for us."

Haniyeh was the longtime leader of Hamas's political wing. He headed the political arm of Hamas and managed the group's finance from the Qatari capital of Doha. He has led Hamas's 15-member political bureau since 2017. He was first appointed assistant to Hamas's founder, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin, in 1997.

The IDF said that it killed Fuad Shukr in retaliation for the deadly rocket strike in the Golan Heights.

Lebanon claimed that the Israeli air strike also killed a woman and two children.

Shukr played a central role in the 1983 bombing of the U.S. Marine Corps Barracks in Beirut, which killed 241 U.S. military personnel.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday after the rocket attack that killed the 14 children that Israel "will not, and cannot, ignore this."

"Our response will come, and it will be severe," Netanyahu said.

This report is based on original reporting by the Washington Post.

To connect with the author of this story, or to comment, email brandonmreporter@gmail.com