More than a Killing of Hamas Political Leader Ismail Haniyeh

A Criminal Enterprise

In post-World War II, except for assassins from Israel, have military and intelligence agencies assassinated political leaders of another nation? Have any of these assassinations occurred in a nation that is not the native nation of the assassinated? Two come to mind.

On March 1, 2020, the Trump government assassinated Iranian General Casem Soleimani in Baghdad, and, on November 28, 1971, four Black September gunmen killed Wasfi Tal, Prime Minister of Jordan, in the lobby of the Sheraton Cairo Hotel in Egypt? U.S. special forces dispatched Osama bin-Laden in Pakistan, but bin-Laden was not a leader of a country. Established nations have a silent agreement of not assassinating another nation’s leaders and consider it an ugly behavior.

There have been assassinations during military coups, in which the United States participated in the takeovers, several attempts to kill Fidel Castro by U.S. agencies, assassinations of dissidents on foreign soil by Russian, Turkish, and Iranian intelligence, and unproven charges of American complicity in assassinations of foreign leaders. Israel’s widespread physical and character assassinations of foreign leaders and civilians are unique; the numbers are staggering, and the world’s inattention to the numbers is chilling.

Foreign civilians murdered by Israel in foreign nations.
Israel’s murders of innocents, who are doing daily tasks to earn bread and assist their countries, are mafia style “hits,” criminal activities to protect criminal activities. They are performed as routine matters, with no regard to the lives of others, as if those who are not Israelis are insignificant human beings.  

September 11, 1962, Heinz Krug, a West German rocket scientist working for Egypt's missile program, was abducted and his body never found. From Operation Damocles:

The Mossad set up a sting involving a former SS officer and war hero named Otto Skorzeny who Krug was led to believe would help keep him and the other scientists safe. Instead, Skorzeny killed Krug and a team of Israeli agents poured acid on his body and buried his remains in the forest outside Munich. The leader of the Mossad team was Yitzhak Shamir, the head of the special operations unit and later prime minister.

In November, 1962, two parcel bombs arrived at the office of the missile project’s director, Wolfgang Pilz, maiming his secretary and killing five Egyptian workers.

In February 1963, another scientist, Hans Kleinwachter, escaped an ambush in Switzerland. That April, two Mossad agents in Basel threatened to kill the project manager Paul Goerke and his daughter. A pistol was fired at a West German professor who was researching electronics for Egypt in the town of Lörrach.  

Note the use of a famous Nazi, Otto Skorzeny, in one of the escapades.

June 13, 1980, Yehia El-Mashad, Egyptian nuclear scientist, was murdered in his room at the Méridien Hotel in Paris. 

September 1981, José Alberto Albano do Amarante, a Brazilian Air Force lieutenant colonel, was  assassinated by the Israeli intelligence service to prevent Brazil from becoming a nuclear nation.

July 14, 1989,  Said S. Bedair, Egyptian scientist in microwave engineering and a colonel in the Egyptian army, fell to his death from the balcony of his brother's apartment in Alexandria, Egypt. His veins were found cut and a gas leak was detected in the apartment. Egyptians claim that the Mossad assassinated him in a way that appeared a suicide.

March 20, 1990,  Gerald Bull, Canadian engineer and designer of the Project Babylon "supergun" for Saddam Hussein's government, was shot at the door to his apartment in Brussels, Belgium. Attributed to Mossad by several sources.

Murdered Iranian Scientists and family members
Mossad has been accused of assassinating Masoud Alimohammadi, Ardeshir Hosseinpour, Majid Shahriari, Darioush Rezaeinejad, and Mostafa Ahmadi-Roshan; scientists involved in the Iranian nuclear and missile programs. In some of the attacks other innocent civilians were killed. Israel is also suspected of being behind the attempted assassination of Iranian nuclear scientist Fereydoon Abbasi. Meir Dagan, who served as Director of Mossad from 2002 until 2009, while not taking credit for the assassinations, praised them in an interview with a journalist, saying "the removal of important brains from the Iranian nuclear project had achieved so-called ‘white defections’, frightening other Iranian nuclear scientists into requesting that they be transferred to civilian projects.”

November 12, 2011,  General Hassan Tehrani Moghaddam, the main architect of the Iranian missile system and the founder of Iran's deterrent power ballistic missile, was assassinated in Tehran.  

April 21, 2018, Fadi Mohammad al-Batsh, a Palestinian engineer, was shot dead by two men on a motorcycle in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

August 5, 2018, Aziz Asbar, Syrian scientist responsible for long-range rockets and chemical weapons programs, was killed by a car bomb in Masyaf, Syria.

November 27, 2020, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, senior official in the nuclear program of Iran, was killed by a remotely operated gun in a truck.    

March 19, 2023,  Ali Ramzi Al-Aswad, Palestinian Islamic Jihad engineer, was killed in the Damascus outskirts. Islamic Jihad accused Israel of the murder.

Killing innocent civilians because they perform activities that assist Israel’s adversaries is not confined to weapons manufacture. Anyone in Gaza who helps Gazans to survive the Israeli onslaught is also in the crosshairs.

Data from the U.N.’s Crisis Coordination Centre In Gaza, released by Dropsite News, shows that, by the end of June, 2024 , Israel’s assault on Gaza killed 195 United Nations staff members and at least 172 dependents of the staff.

The killing of seven aid workers from World Central Kitchen alarmed the world. It was not an “isolated mistake.” NBC News reports,

But while the Israel Defense Forces investigation suggests this was an isolated “grave mistake,” the mounting toll faced by aid agencies throughout the war points instead to what they say are systemic failings in the IDF’s approach to protecting humanitarian workers in the Gaza Strip. According to the United Nations, a total of 224 humanitarian aid workers have been killed since the start of the war.

Murder of Palestinian and Hezbollah leaders.
Israel seems to delight in killing leaders and family members of those opposing Israel, while knowing the deceased leader will be replaced by another leader. Violating the sovereignty of other nations by blooding their soils does not bother the Israelis. They always excuse the killings by claiming the leader had given orders for a violent action against Israelis, without noting that the violent action succeeded several Israeli violent actions against the Palestinians and Israel could terminate the extrajudicial killings by granting the Palestinians their deserved freedom. The Israelis are special people; they are allowed to murder whomever, wherever, and whenever. Some examples.

April 16, 1988, Abu Jihad, second-in-command to Yassir Arafat, was shot dead in front of his family by Israeli commandos in Tunis.     

February 16, 1992, Abbas al-Musawi , Secretary-General of Hezbollah, was killed by Israeli Apache helicopters that fired missiles at the 3 vehicle motorcade of al-Musawi in southern Lebanon, killing him, his wife, his five-year-old son, and four others.

March 22, 2004,  Ahmed Yassin, the frail and nearly blind paraplegic co-founder of Hamas, two bodyguards, and seven bystanders were killed by Israeli Air Force AH-64 Apache-fired Hellfire missiles. Seventeen bystanders were wounded.  

April 17, 2004, Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi, successor to Ahmed Yassin. was killed by helicopter-fired missiles, along with his son and bodyguard. Several bystanders were injured.

July 31, 2024, Ismail Haniyeh, political leader of Hamas, was killed by a bomb in Tehran. Eighty innocent members of Haniyeh’s close and extended family had already been systematically killed by Israel.

Haniyeh’s murder reminded me of the failed attempt to kill Khaled Mashaal, Hamas’ previous political leader. I met Khaled Mashaal in Damascus, Syria, where he went after his recovery. My notes on that meeting.

Not kosher was a clandestine trip to meet a "minor" Hamas official, who turned out to be Khalid Meshaal, official political leader of Hamas, exiled in Damascus. The world became more aware of Meshaal when Israel's Mossad tried to assassinate him in Amman. Jordan's King Abdullah forced Israel to immediately supply an antidote to the poison given to Meshaal by threatening to publicly hang the Mossad agents who tried to kill the Hamas leader.

Meshaal does not fill the western media description of a wild eyed fanatic. On the contrary, he is a friendly, deliberate, and well-spoken person who makes sense to the many who subscribe to similar positions. He said that Israel does not want peace and both negotiating parties aren't strong enough to market their results to their peoples. Meshaal doesn't delineate Hamas' positions, but defers to a Palestinian position that accepts 1967 borders and an Arab position that has accepted the two-state solution. Since 2002, Bush has repeatedly spoken of support for a two-state solution, but where is it? The Hamas leader expects the region to be more explosive. Nevertheless, if the PA feels the Palestinian rights have been fulfilled, Hamas will welcome that. He has proposed a Hudna (truce), and if Israel responds positively, Hamas will not be an obstacle to peace. If the Right of Return is the only remaining problem, Hamas will compromise, and accept the will of the people. He claims Hamas does not encourage militancy, does not desire a theocratic state, is a national liberation movement, and will let the Palestinian people decide its own government.

The February 1986 assassination of Sven Olof Palme, Prime Minister of Sweden from 1969 to 1976 and 1982 to 1986, has never been solved. Swedish prosecutor Krister Petersson claimed “there was ‘reasonable evidence’ that the assailant was Stig Engstrom, a graphic designer at an insurance company, who killed himself in 2000, at the age of 66, and could not rule out the possibility that Mr. Engstrom had acted as part of a larger conspiracy.” Olof Palme, who had credibility and many admirers, was a severe critic of Israel, at a time when no Western leader voiced arguments against Israel. Could Mossad have been involved in his killing?

Systematic Murder of Journalists
Journalists are well identified and, in battles that have no battleground and are person to person, there is little possibility of a journalist becoming a casualty unless deliberately targeted. The only reason to deliberately target a journalist is to prevent the presentation of the truth.

As of August 6, 2024, the Committee to protect Journalists (CPJ) “preliminary investigations showed at least 113 journalists and media workers were among the more than 40,000 killed since the war began, making it the deadliest period for journalists since CPJ began gathering data in 1992.” A previous report, in May 2024, “found that Israeli soldiers had killed at least 20 journalists in the last 22 years and none had ever been charged or held accountable.”

The most well-known murder of a journalist was the May 11, 2022 deliberate targeting of Shireen Abu Akleh, “a prominent Palestinian-American journalist who worked as a reporter for 25 years for Al Jazeera while wearing a blue press vest and covering a raid on the Jenin refugee camp in the Israeli-occupied West Bank.” The Biden administration insisted “on ‘full and transparent accounting’ of death of Palestinian American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh.” Despite not receiving any accounting, Biden has done nothing to punish Israel.

Write “bad” stories about the Mafia and the Mafia retaliates, and apparently without concern ─ proof that Mafia Israel controls the American government.

Revenge attacks on Adversaries
Anyone who harmed an Israeli can expect to be hunted down and receive retribution. Hundreds of Palestinians and Lebanese Hezbollah have been found guilty without trial, and they and innocent others of mistaken identity have been blasted from the Earth. Three things wrong with the bold strikes.

(1)    They do not prevent the deaths of Israel’s citizens and soldiers; they only retaliate for the deaths. Why were the Israelis killed? Their murders revenged the killings and extreme harm done to individual Palestinians and the Palestinian community.

(2)    Since day one of the Zionist invasion, the Israel population has been guilty of theft of Palestinian lands, wanton killings of Palestinians, destruction of their communities, oppression, ethnic cleansing, and interferences in their daily life. The Palestinians have a valid reason for their attacks. No Israeli is innocent.

(3) Israel’s retaliations are not revenge; they are a way of telling the Palestinians, “If you counter our thefts and oppression of your community we will strike you harder.

(4)    Hamas and Hezbollah have warned Israel to halt all attacks on the Palestinian community. Israel ignores the threats and willingly provokes Hamas and Hezbollah into counterattacks.

Character Assassinations
No officials in the world’s governments speak in the vicious and demeaning manner of other officials as do Israeli officials; dehumanizing Palestinians and defaming antagonists.

Every decision by United Nations (UN) agencies and Human Rights organizations that contradicts Israel’s polices is met with derision by Israeli officials. As an example, when the UN General Assembly overwhelmingly called for an immediate humanitarian truce between Israel and Hamas, Israel’s UN Ambassador, Gilad Erdan, said the UN no longer held "even one ounce of legitimacy or relevance."

Speaking at a conference in Israel, Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said, “Nobody will let us cause two million civilians to die of hunger, even though it might be justified and moral, until our hostages are returned."

 Israel’s former justice minister, Ayelet Shaked, posted on Facebook:

Behind every terrorist stand dozens of men and women, without whom he could not engage in terrorism. They are all enemy combatants, and their blood shall be on all their heads. Now this also includes the mothers of the martyrs, who send them to hell with flowers and kisses. They should follow their sons, nothing would be more just. They should go, as should the physical homes in which they raised the snakes. Otherwise, more little snakes will be raised there.

Stereotypes and prejudice in conflict: Representations of Arabs in Israeli Jewish society, Bar-Tal, D., & Teichman, Y. (2005), Cambridge University Press, P.359 reports that “10% of the drawings in a sample of children asked to sketch a typical Arab depicted them as animals. Extensive evidence that Israeli children, when asked about Arabs, spoke of them in terms of pigs and other animals (as well as "barbarians," "Nazis," and murderers).”

A worldwide contingent of Israel supporters defame Israel’s critics with false charges of anti-Semitism and media attacks that ruin reputations, cause loss of employment, and isolate individuals.

The Canary Mission, documents people and groups that it falsely accuses of promoting hatred of the USA, Israel, and Jews on North American college campuses. This bigoted organization also posts its Jewish Friends of Anti-Semites
ADL, an organization concerned with false stereotypes, publishes its Top Ten Anti-Israel Groups in America.
AMCHA, joins the forces of Israel supporters that make a mockery of the word anti-Semite, with its list of more than 200 anti-Israel Middle East Studies professors, many of whom are Jews.

Israel is a Criminal Enterprise
Middle East commentators ponder the reasons for Israel’s policy of targeted assassinations. Do they halt aggressive activities that counter Israel? Are they meant to intimidate people so they become fearful of engaging in actions that upset Israel or lead to the belief that their death is an act of mercy? Do they serve “as a mechanism to galvanize its own society rather than genuinely altering the political or military stance of its adversaries,” mentioned by Abdaljawad Omar in an article, The real reason Israel is assassinating Hamas and Hezbollah leaders, and why it won’t stop the resistance? It’s all part of a pattern, the pattern of a criminal enterprise and not the pattern of an established nation.

Nations are formed from a community of people who share a common land, language, culture, ethnicity, descent, and history for centuries. The Zionists were disparate people from several nations who shared only a common religion and some cultural characteristics. If it were otherwise, why has Israel given its Jews the scaffolding of a new nation by giving them a common language and culture, and replacing their distinguishing descents and history with a spurious ancient history narrative? No established state has governments, leaders, and people who express themselves in the despicable manner and commit extrajudicial crimes in the violent manner as does Israel. The gathering of violent people, their engagement in continuous battle to gain territory and resources, and their strong arming of those who interfere with the thievery and oppressive control are the efforts of a criminal enterprise.

Lack of understanding of the governing nature and violent behavior of Israel has led to a faulty approach to resolving the Middle East crisis. There are no two-state, no one-state, no confederation, and no federal solutions to the crisis. There is only a “no state,” a state without borders or constitution, that ignores international law, that does not answer UN condemnations and international court lawsuits; a criminal enterprise that pleads for an international police force to defeat the criminals and prevent additional murderous catastrophes.

This is not a sarcastic and fanciful gaze at world politics. Engage Israelis in negotiations and find you are negotiating how much you are willing to be robbed. Those who honestly sought and still seek a reasonable compromise and solution of the crisis by negotiations have not factored into their arguments the true nature of the Zionist criminal mission and its criminal constituents; a criminality that is international, extending to money laundering, ecstasy trade, prostitution, arms trade, and harboring criminals, including sex criminals fleeing the law. Israel does what it wants, when it wants, and where it wants, not functioning as a normal state and as a criminal enterprise.   

All of Israel’s worldwide supporters are criminals by association. The rewards to these aiders and abettors are neither beneficial nor tangible; they are willing to receive nothing, while knowing they share in the horrors done to others. They earn contempt from the world community, and, hopefully, will, one day, receive justice of years in prisons.