▲ Hamas senior commander Khalil al-Hayya (center) prays in front of the coffin of Palestinian Islamist leader Ismail Haniyeh and his bodyguard in Doha, Qatar.Photo Qatar Tv via Afp
AFP, Europa Press, The Independent and Reuters
The newspaper La Jornada
Saturday, August 3, 2024, p. 18
Doha. Thousands of worshippers attended yesterday the funeral of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Qatar, who was killed in Iran in an attack for which the Palestinian movement accuses Israel. Haniyeh He was a symbol, a leader of the resistance; people are angry”We are very sorry to hear the news,” said Taher Adel, a 25-year-old Jordanian student living in Doha, where the Palestinian leader had his residence.
Under temperatures of 44 degrees Celsius, mourners prayed inside the mosque of Imam Muhamad bin Abdulwahab, the largest in Qatar, while thousands of others did so outside.
Around the coffin, under a security cordon, the faithful gathered with scarves printed with the Palestinian flag, the traditional black and white kufiya, and the message in English. Free Palestine.
In a statement, Izzat al Rishq, a member of the Hamas political cabinet, said: Let today, Friday, be a day of overwhelming anger denouncing the crime of murder and rejecting the genocide in the Gaza Strip.
Haniyeh was the target of an explosive attack on the building where he was staying during his visit to Tehran to attend the inauguration of the new Iranian president, Masud Pezeshkian. He was buried yesterday in a cemetery in Lusail, north of the Qatari capital.
According to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, one of the Hamas political leader’s bodyguards was also killed. Yesterday in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, the diplomatic missions of Turkey – which like Pakistan declared a day of mourning for Haniyeh’s death – lowered their flags to half-mast, an action that caused the Israeli Foreign Ministry to summon the Turkish deputy ambassador for a reprimand.
The State of Israel will not tolerate expressions of mourning for a murderer like Haniya, who led Hamas as it committed the atrocities on October 7 and prayed with his partners wishing success to the murderers as they watched the horrific images on television.wrote Foreign Minister Israel Katz on the social network X.
Besides, If the embassy representatives want to mourn, they should go to Turkey and mourn alongside their master, (Turkish President Recep Tayyip) Erdogan, who embraces the terrorist organization Hamas and supports its acts of murder and terror.added the head of the Israeli government’s diplomacy.
Meanwhile, Israeli police are investigating Muslim preacher Ekrima Sabri, who praised Haniyeh during a prayer at the Al Aqsa mosque in old Jerusalem. In his sermon, Sabri said that the inhabitants of Jerusalem They had in their prayers the martyr Ismail Haniye, for whom they asked mercy.
Iranian Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri Kani called for Israel to be stopped from preserve peace in the Middle East and accused its military forces of extend the scope of its crimes to Beirut and Tehran.
Meanwhile in Lebanon, Prime Minister Nayib Mikati claimed the country’s right to defend their land, their sovereignty and their dignity by all meansalso accused Israel of having a boundless arrogance.
The Pentagon has also announced that it will strengthen its defensive capabilities in the Middle East to protect its forces and help Israel defend itself.
In this regard, the American president, Joe Biden – who declared that the assassination of Haniye does not help to advance the dialogue to reach a ceasefire – discussed yesterday with the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, the new military deployments to protect Tel Aviv following Israeli attacks in Lebanon and Iran, the White House said in a statement.