Two US airlines suspend flights to Tel Aviv – as it happened | World news

Patrick Wintour

The assassination of Ismail Haniyeh has plunged Masoud Pezeshkhian, the newly inaugurated Iranian president, into a major crisis in his first days in office as he faces internal demands to respond to what amounts to a humiliating targeting of an ally while visiting Tehran to attend his own inauguration – even as he seeks better ties with the west.

Pezeshkhian vowed his country would “defend its territory” and make the attackers regret their action.

The choice of Tehran, as opposed to Qatar, where Haniyeh mainly resides, or Turkey which he regularly visited, is likely to be about more than just opportunity. It is also a chance to show to a global audience that the IRGC cannot defend its most prized political assets, even in its own capital.

Worse still, is the fact that Haniyeh was in Tehran with 110 other foreign delegations, including leaders of the supposed “axis of resistance”, to attend Pezeshkian’s inauguration, underlining to others how little protection the IRGC can, in practice, provide to its dearest diplomatic allies.

Pezeshkian, who is in the midst of forming a reformist cabinet, was elected partly on a strategy of building better relations with the west, as a way of boosting the ailing Iranian economy and lifting economic sanctions, but that already internally controversial strategy now looks harder to follow.

Read on below:

• Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh has been killed, according to Hamas and Iran’s Revolutionary Guards. Israel has yet to make any comment on Haniyeh’s killing but in its statement, Hamas accused Israel of the attack.

• A funeral for Haniyeh will be held in Tehran on Thursday and then his body will be transferred to Qatar’s capital Doha for prayers and burial, Hamas said. Iran’s state media has announced that there will be three days of national mourning in the country for Haniyeh.

• The Hamas statement said the group mourned Haniyeh “who died as a result of a treacherous Zionist raid on his residence in Tehran, after participating in the inauguration ceremony of the new Iranian president”.

• Hamas’s deputy chief in Gaza, Khalil Al-Hayya, said Hamas and Iran do not want a regional war, but there is a crime that should be punished. The comment came from a press conference in Tehran after the killing of the Palestinian group’s chief Ismail Haniyeh.

• An Israeli government spokesperson has said that Israel is not commenting on the death of Haniyeh. “We are not commenting on that particular incident,” spokesperson David Mencer told a briefing with journalists on Wednesday.

• Avenging Haniyeh’s assassination is “Tehran’s duty” because it occurred in the Iranian capital, Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has said. Iranian president Masoud Pezeshkian said the country will “defend its territorial integrity, dignity, honor, and pride, and will make the terrorist occupiers regret their cowardly act”.

• Iran’s Revolutionary Guards said Haniyeh had been targeted in his residence along with an Iranian bodyguard. It said he had been in Iran to attend the inauguration of president Masoud Pezeshkian and that the circumstances of the “incident” was being investigated.

• Senior Hamas official Moussa Abu Marzouk said Haniyeh’s death was a “cowardly act that will not go unpunished”, according to al-Aqsa TV. Another Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri has told Reuters that the killing is a grave escalation that will not achieve its goals.

• The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said the US was not involved in or made aware of the assassination of Haniyeh. “This is something we were not aware of or involved in. It’s very hard to speculate,” Blinken said in an interview with Channel News Asia during a visit to Singapore.

• Haniyeh’s death came just hours after Israel claimed it killed Hezbollah’s top military commander, Fuad Shukur, in an airstrike on a south Beirut suburb launched in retaliation for a rocket attack that killed 12 children at the weekend. Hezbollah confirmed on Wednesday that Shukur was killed in an Israeli strike.

• Lebanon’s armed group Hezbollah issued its condolences on Wednesday after Haniyeh’s death. Hezbollah did not specifically accuse Israel but said it would make Iran-aligned groups more determined to confront Israel.

• Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas has strongly condemned the killing, Palestinian state news agency Wafa reported. Palestinian national and Islamic factions have also called for a general strike and mass demonstrations in response to the assassination.

• Qatar’s foreign ministry called the killing a “heinous crime” and “shameful assassination”. Turkey echoed the condemnation. Egypt said Israeli escalation indicated a lack of political will from Israel for de-escalation, after the killing of Haniyeh in Tehran. Malaysian prime minister Anwar Ibrahim said he condemned “in the strongest possible terms” the assassination of Haniyeh, calling him a “valiant advocate for his people”.

• The UN security council is holding an emergency meeting in efforts to keep tensions in the region from boiling over. UN chief António Guterres said the airstrikes in Tehran and Beirut were “a dangerous escalation”.

• Although Israel has not formally commented on Haniyeh’s killing, several Israeli ministers reacted on social media. The heritage minister, Amichay Eliyahu, celebrated his killing, writing on Twitter/X: “Haniyeh’s death makes the world a little better” and that this is the “right way to clean the world from this filth”. Shlomo Karhi, minister of communications, wrote on X: “Yes, all your enemies will perish, O God”, although the post appeared later to have been deleted. Amichai Chikli, minister of diaspora affairs and combating antisemitism, posted a video of the Hamas leader on X with the caption: “Careful What You Wish For”.

• Benjamin Netanyahu warned that Israel will “make anyone who is against us pay a very heavy price.” The Israeli prime minister did not mention Haniyeh’s killing, but said his country is “prepared for any scenario” and stands “determined against any threat”.

• Al Jazeera said two of its journalists have been killed in an attack on the Gaza Strip. The Qatar-based broadcaster has named them as Al Jazeera Arabic journalist Ismail al-Ghoul and his cameraman Rami al-Rifee. It has not shared any further information.

• The UK’s foreign minister, David Lammy, and defence minister, John Healey, travelled to Qatar to help drive efforts to end the conflict in Gaza and call for de-escalation in the wider region, the UK government said on Wednesday.

• The Australian foreign minister, Penny Wong, has warned about the risk of escalation in the Middle East and urged Australians to leave Lebanon. In a video message, Wong said: “Now is not the time for Australians in the region to wait and see what happens. Now is the time to leave.”

• The UK’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO) has advised against all travel to Lebanon. In a social media post on Wednesday, the FCDO also advised any British nationals in Lebanon to register their presence on Gov.uk.

The US was not aware of or involved in the apparent killing of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh, says the US representative to the UN, Robert Wood.

Wood calls on UN security council members with direct influence over Iran to increase pressure on the country to “stop escalating its proxy conflict against Israel”.

Every member of this council should call on Iran to stop arming, advising and financing terrorist groups and to rein in the actions of proxies and partners who threaten regional peace and security.

Wood warns that it is a “dangerous” moment, and that it is “imperative” for members to work together to reduce tensions in the region.