Iran says a short-range projectile killed Haniyeh

TEHERAN — Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps said a short-range projectile was behind the killing of Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh and accused the United States of supporting the attack which it blamed on Israel, state TV reported on Saturday.

The televised statement, which reiterated a call for retaliation, said a rocket with a 7-kilogram warhead was used to target the residence of Hamas' political leader in the capital Teheran on Wednesday, adding it caused heavy devastation. It didn't share details of the residence's location.

Haniyeh was in Iran to attend the inauguration of newly elected Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian.

"The action was designed and carried out by the Zionist regime and supported by the US," said the Guard's statement. It added that "the warmongering and terrorist Zionist regime will receive harsh punishment at the suitable time, place and capacity".

Israel has not confirmed or denied its role in the killing of Haniyeh, but Israel earlier pledged to kill him and other Hamas leaders over the group's Oct 7 attack on southern Israel that sparked the conflict in Gaza.

US President Joe Biden was asked on Saturday night in Wilmington, Delaware whether he thought Iran would stand down. He responded: "I hope so. I don't know."

The assassination has fueled fears of a wider regional conflict, after the assassinations of Haniyeh and top Hezbollah commander Fouad Shukur in Beirut the evening before.

An Israeli airstrike on a school sheltering displaced persons in Gaza City killed at least 15 Palestinians on Saturday, hours after two strikes in the occupied West Bank killed nine militants, including a local Hamas commander, Hamas said.

The Israeli military said the first of two West Bank airstrikes hit a vehicle in a town near the city of Tulkarm, targeting a militant cell it said was on its way to carry out an attack.

A Hamas statement said one of those killed was a commander of its Tulkarm brigades, while the Islamic Jihad claimed the other four men who died in the strike as its fighters.

Hours later, a second airstrike in the area targeted another group of militants who had fired on troops, Israel's military said, during what it described as a counterterrorism operation in Tulkarm.

Palestinian news agency WAFA said four people had died in that strike, and Hamas said all nine of those killed in the two Israeli attacks in the West Bank were fighters.

Jordan's Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi was scheduled to travel to Iran on Sunday in a visit to discuss regional developments with his Iranian counterpart, Iranian state media reported.

The Pentagon said late on Friday the US military will move a fighter jet squadron to the Middle East and maintain an aircraft carrier in the region.

Agencies Via Xinhua