Plane carrying body of Hamas leader arrives in Qatar

A plane carrying the body of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, killed in a strike in Tehran blamed on Israel, landed in Doha Thursday after a public funeral in Iran, Qatar-based network Al Jazeera reported.

Haniyeh, who had resided in exile in the Gulf state with other members of Hamas’s political office, is to be buried in Qatar on Friday following prayers at the Imam Muhammad bin Abdul Wahhab Mosque, Doha’s largest.

Haniyeh and a bodyguard were killed in the pre-dawn strike on their accommodation in Tehran early Wednesday, Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said, in an attack that has been blamed on Israel.

Hamas said in a statement on the same day that the burial ceremonies in Qatar would be held “with popular and factional attendance and the participation of Arab and Islamic leaders”.

A public funeral ceremony for Haniyeh was held in Tehran earlier on Thursday, with crowds of mourners paying their respects to the Hamas political chief.

Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei led prayers for Haniyeh having earlier threatened “harsh punishment” for his killing.

The Hamas leader’s assassination came just hours after Israel killed top Hezbollah commander, Fuad Shukr, in a strike in Beirut, stoking fears of wider conflict as the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza rages on.

Israel has not commented on Haniyeh’s death but both Hamas and Iran said it was the result of an Israeli ari strike.

It did claim the killing of Shukr, blaming him for a weekend rocket strike that killed 12 children in the Israeli-annexed Golan Heights.