Mossad hired Iranian agents to plant bombs at Haniyeh’s residence

Mossad, Israel’s intelligence service, hired Iranian security agents to plant explosives in three different rooms of a building where the Hamas leader was staying, The Telegraph has learned.

The original plan was to assassinate Ismail Haniyeh, the political leader of the Palestinian terrorist organization, in May while he was attending the funeral of Ebrahim Raisi, former president of Iran.

The operation did not take place because of the large crowd in the building and the high probability of failure, two Iranian officials told The Telegraph.

Instead, agents placed explosives in three rooms of an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) guesthouse in northern Tehran where Haniyeh may have been staying.

According to officials with surveillance footage of the building, the agents were seen moving discreetly, entering and exiting multiple rooms over the course of several minutes.

The agents are said to have slipped out of the country but still have a source in Iran. At 2 a.m. Wednesday, they detonated explosives from abroad in the room where Haniyeh was staying.

The explosion killed Haniyeh, who was in Tehran for the inauguration of President Masoud Pezeshkian.

“They are now certain that Mossad hired agents from the Ansar al-Mahdi security unit,” an IRGC official told the Tehran-based Telegraph, referring to the IRGC unit responsible for the security of high-ranking officials.

He said: “Following further investigation, further explosive devices were discovered in two other rooms.”

A second official from the IRGC’s elite armed forces told the Telegraph: “It is a humiliation for Iran and a huge security breach.”

The official said a working group had been set up to develop ideas to present the attack as an incident that did not constitute a security breach.

“It’s still a question for everyone how this happened, I can’t understand it. There must be something higher in the hierarchy that no one knows about,” he added.

As the first official The Telegraph spoke to revealed, an internal blame game is currently underway within the IRGC, with different sectors blaming each other for the failure.

Esmail Qaani, commander of the IRGC Quds Force, called for the people to be released, arrested and possibly executed, he said. “This violation has humiliated everyone.”

The official added: “The Supreme Leader has summoned all commanders several times over the past two days and wants answers.

“For him, it is more important now to address the security breach than to seek revenge.”

The IRGC is currently considering retaliatory options, including a direct attack on Tel Aviv, which would require the involvement of Lebanon’s Hezbollah and other Iranian allies, The Telegraph reported.

Haniyeh’s assassination in the Iranian capital has heightened concerns about Israel’s reach and influence in Iran.

Ali Younisi, Iran’s former intelligence minister, expressed concern in a 2020 interview, saying, “All officials of the Islamic Republic should worry about their lives.”

“If the Zionist regime has not yet targeted the political authorities of the Islamic Republic, it is because it has not made such a decision,” he said.

“This negligence on Mossad’s part has allowed it to launch repeated attacks and open threats against officials of the Islamic Republic,” he added.

An “intentional” coincidence

Haniyeh’s assassination coincided with Mr Pezeshkian’s first day in office.

During the election campaign, he distanced himself from the Islamic Republic’s previous provocative policies and promised to rebuild Iran’s position in the international arena through dialogue.

A close associate of Mr Pezeshkian suggested in an interview with The Telegraph that the security lapse may have been a deliberate move by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps to damage the new president’s reputation.

An assistant who worked on Mr. Pezeshkian’s election campaign claimed that the IRGC did not accept his views on international diplomacy and other aspects of his reformist policies.

“No intact brain can accept that this happened by accident, especially on Mr. Pezeshkian’s first day in office,” he said. “He may have to go to war with Israel within his first few days in office, and it’s all because of the IRGC.”

However, Mr Pezeshkian’s son announced on Friday evening that the country’s priority “is not war with Israel”

“Poverty, corruption, discrimination, inequality, and wasteful political factions and debates are the real fronts on which the Iranian people are fighting in our country,” Dr. Yousef Pezeshkian said on his website.

“Social reforms and progress in Iran are the best counterattacks we can launch against Israel,” he added.

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