Politics

Haniyeh a one-off? Israel is no stranger to assassinations in Iran

The Hamas chief joins a growing list of Israeli enemies to be gunned down or blown up in the heart of the Islamic Republic

Axel Rangel Garcia

Ismail Haniyeh's assassination in Iran is merely the latest in a long line of Israeli killings and attacks in the Islamic Republic.

Haniyeh a one-off? Israel is no stranger to assassinations in Iran

Sami Moubayed

last update on 01 Aug 2024

Ismail Haniyeh’ assassination in the heart of the Iranian capital when he was supposedly under the protection of the powerful Revolutionary Guards is but the latest in a long line of Israeli killings in the Islamic Republic.

A former prime minister and chairman of Hamas’s political bureau, Haniyeh’s assassination on 31 July came as no surprise given Israel’s pledged to hit the group’s top leaders since Hamas attacked southern Israel on 7 October 2023.

Many of his colleagues have been killed in similar fashion. Hamas founder Sheikh Ahmad Yassin, and his successor Abdul Aziz al-Rantisi, were killed within three weeks of one another in 2004.

Crossing red lines

Haniyeh’s killing was notably for being so deep within Iranian territory, right in the heart of the capital on Inauguration Day, hours after the country’s new president Masoud Pezeshkian was sworn in.

Just months after Israel bombed the Iranian consulate in Damascus, killing several senior Iranian generals inside, this may have been yet another ‘red line’ that Tel Aviv has seemingly crossed.

Mohamed Azakir/Reuters — Palestinians at a refugee camp in Beirut carry pictures of Hamas deputy leader Saleh al-Arouri and political leader Ismail Haniyeh. Both have now been assassinated.

In 2021, Israel’s then Prime Minister Naftali Bennett revealed that Israel’s Mossad spy agency had kidnapped and interrogated an Iranian general to discover the whereabouts of Israeli airman Ron Arad, who was last heard from in 1988.

Bennett’s announcement was an anomaly, given Israel generally keeps quiet about its operations in Iran, which has led to a degree of speculation over the years, not least when it comes to cyber-attacks and assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists.

Using digital weapons

The beginning of Israel’s unconventional warfare began in June 2010, when the Stuxnet computer virus was developed by Israeli programmers and made its way into Iranian IT systems at the Bushehr nuclear power plant before spreading, infecting 30,000 computers across 14 Iranian facilities.

In April 2011, a new virus named Stars was exported to Iranian nuclear plants. Half a year later, in November 2011 third-generation virus Duqu was unleashed.

Israel's unconventional warfare began in 2010 when the Stuxnet virus made its way into Iranian computer systems at the Bushehr nuclear power plant

In April 2012, a malware called Wiper erased computer hard drives at the Iran's oil ministry. Soon, another virus, called Flame, was installed remotely, aimed at stealing nuclear data from Iranian computers.

Most of these cyber-attacks went unnoticed in the world's mainstream media and were downplayed by the Iranians in terms of their damage and efficiency to any who asked. Yet the targeting was not limited to software.

Iran's nuclear scientists

Conventional attacks were also employed as was the full gamut of assassination methods, including drive-by shootings, car bombings, and even poisoning. Among the first was Ardeshir Hosseinpour, killed on 15 January 2007.

A nuclear scientist and professor of physics, he died mysteriously during his nuclear work in Isfahan, reportedly from radioactive poisoning. Israel was accused, but ex-Mossad chief Meir Amit denied it.

AFP — The reactor at the Bushehr nuclear power plant in southern Iran, 1200km south of Tehran.

Three years later, on 12 January 2010, Massoud Ali Mohammadi, a quantum field theorist and professor at the University of Tehran, was targeted in his car outside his home as he left for work in the morning.

Explosives rigged to a motorbike parked near his car were detonated, killed him instantly.

A few months later, Iran announced the arrest of Majid Jamali Fashi, the alleged assassin, claiming that he worked for Mossad. He confessed on state TV and was hanged in 2012. His identity is believed to have come from a WikiLeaks cable.

Beware the motorbike

By the end of 2010, another scientist, Majid Shahriari, who worked with the Atomic Energy Organisation of Iran, was killed. His car was blown up on 29 November 2010.

The same day, head of the Atomic Energy Organisation, Fereydoon Abbasi, barely survived an assassination attempt, also in Tehran, after a man on a motorbike attached a bomb to his car.

On 23 July 2011, nuclear physicist Darioush Rezaeinejad was shot dead by gunmen on motorcycles in Tehran while on 11 January 2012 Mustafa Roshan, who worked at the Natanz Nuclear Power Plant, was killed in a motorbike bomb.

Killing the mastermind

The most prominent victim, however, was Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, killed on 27 November 2020. He was widely considered to be the "brain" behind Iran's nuclear programme and was one of the country's most tightly protected VIPs.

The most prominent victim was Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, killed in 2020. He was widely considered to be the "brain" behind Iran's nuclear programme.

Born in Qom in 1958, he joined the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps after the Islamic Revolution of 1979, before establishing himself as a frontline nuclear physicist and professor at Imam Hussein University.

AFP — The damaged car of Iranian nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh after it was attacked near the capital Tehran. The scientist died at the hospital from his injuries.

He was killed in a road ambush in the city of Absard near Tehran, via a satellite-operated machine gun positioned atop a Nissan vehicle, shot 15 times at a range of 150 metres, killing him on the spot. This was during a Covid lock-down so the streets were empty, giving the Israelis room to manoeuvre.

Iranian army commander Abdul Rahim al-Mousawi blamed Israel, as did then Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif.

The New York Times reported that Israel had been planning to assassinate Fakhrizadeh since 2009, but only acted after the US assassinated Iran's elite Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani in Baghdad on 3 January 2020.

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