News / Palestine

Hamas begins consultations to choose Haniyeh’s successor

Sunday, 04 August 2024 3:39 PM [ Last Update: Sunday, 04 August 2024 4:15 PM ]

Iranians take part in a protest against the killing of Ismail Haniyeh. (Via Getty Images)

Hamas has initiated consultations to select a new leader of the Palestinian resistance group after the assassination of its Political Bureau chief Ismail Haniyeh by the Israeli regime in Tehran.

In a statement released on Sunday, Hamas said it had begun a "broad consultation process" to choose a new leader three days after the assassination of Haniyeh, who was the face of the group's international diplomacy.

“Following the martyrdom of our leader, the leaders of the movement have started a broad consultation process within its hierarchy and advisory institutions to choose a new chief,” the statement read.

The resistance group said Haniyeh’s killing “would only make the Hamas and the Palestinian resistance stronger and more determined to continue his path and approach.”

The statement also said the results of consultations will be announced as soon as they are completed.

The development came four days after Ismail Haniyeh, the head of the political bureau of the Palestinian Hamas resistance group, was assassinated in an Israeli attack on his residence in the Iranian capital.

Haniyeh was in Tehran to attend the inauguration of Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian.

The Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) said in a statement that the terrorist attack involved the use of a short-range projectile armed with a warhead weighing approximately seven kilograms.

The crime was planned and executed by Israel with the support of the US government, the IRGC added, warning that the Zionist regime would receive “a severe punishment at the appropriate time, place and manner.”

‘Israeli policy of assassination cannot weaken Palestinian resistance front’

Meanwhile, Israeli air and artillery strikes on Gaza continue unabated as the genocidal war marks 303 days.

In one of the latest attacks, at least 30 Palestinians were killed and many others injured in Israeli strikes on Hassan Salameh and al-Nasr schools in Gaza City.

Mahmoud Basal, the spokesman of the Palestinian Civil Defence in Gaza, says the Israeli forces have committed “a massacre in every sense of the word” by bombing the schools.

He described the scenes where the schools were hit as “difficult and tragic” with children accounting for 80% of those killed and wounded.

Earlier attacks on Sunday were also deadly, with at least five people being killed after the Israeli military targeted tents of the displaced Palestinians inside al-Aqsa Martyrs Hospital in Deir al-Balah.