This week, Israel staged a daring attack in the Iranian capital of Tehran, killing Hamas’s political chief Ismail Haniyeh.Haniyeh and one of his bodyguards were killed after a hidden bomb exploded in the building where they were staying.Mossad agents placed the bomb in the guest house weeks earlier, according to a report in the New York Times.Haniyeh was in Tehran to attend the inauguration ceremony of Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian on July 30.In a statement carried by Iranian media, Pezeshkian said Iran would “defend its territorial integrity, dignity, honor, and pride, and will make the terrorist occupiers regret their cowardly act.”It was the second high-profile assassination attributed to Israel in a matter of hours, coming after an airstrike in Beirut that killed Hezbollah’s top military leader. Israel had vowed to kill Haniyeh and other leaders of Hamas after the Gaza-based terror group’s devastating October 7 attack on Israel that killed 1,200 people and saw 251 taken hostage.Israeli military spokesman Jonathan Conricus, would say:"All of them are dead men walking and it's only a matter of time inside Gaza and outside of Gaza, until these Hamas leaders will either be captured or killed by Israel."Much like the '72 Munich terrorists, the key Hamas ringleaders are all going down, one by one. And Israel doesn't seem to care what the world thinks, possibly alienating itself further from accepted norms.Sources say at least 39,400 Palestinians have been killed in Israel’s war, with nearly 91,000 injured.According to media reports, the Hamas leader was killed when an “airborne guided projectile” hit a special residence for military veterans in the north of Tehran, at about 2am (22:30 GMT on July 30.)Israel remained silent on Haniyeh’s death, with media there reporting that the office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had ordered cabinet ministers not to comment. Far-right Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu, however, celebrated the Hamas leader’s death on social media platform X.The killing “makes the world a little better,” he wrote in Hebrew..Chinese officials were quick to condemn the attack.“We are highly concerned about the incident and firmly oppose and condemn the assassination,” foreign ministry spokesman Lin Jian said. “Gaza should achieve a comprehensive and permanent ceasefire as soon as possible.”Both Russia and Turkey were also critical of Israel.“This is an absolutely unacceptable political murder, and it will lead to further escalation of tensions,” said Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov.Haniyeh’s killing “once again demonstrates that Israel’s Netanyahu government has no intention of achieving peace,” Turkey’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement. “[The] region will face much larger conflicts if [the] international community does not take action to stop Israel.”Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas released a statement strongly condemning the attack, calling it a "cowardly act and a dangerous development."He also called on Palestinians to unite and be patient and steadfast in the face of Israeli occupation.Haniyeh was a political figure, and a pragmatic one. He was known for maintaining very positive relations with Palestinian leaders from all factions — a reason why we have seen a rush of expression of solidarity.Indeed, it's possible he may not have known about the planned Oct. 7 attack.The assassination could also leave Hamas hardliners in a better position to dictate its agenda, leaving little traction to keep ceasefire hopes alive.Meanwhile, the Tehran missile attack may have helped restore the tattered image of the Mossad, the vaunted Israeli intelligence service, after the disaster of Oct. 7 — but not entirely.Such was the intelligence failure — Israel has called the bloody attack its 9/11 — the famed agency was forced to openly admit that it was "surprised" by the attack.Even more inexcusable, Israeli military intelligence had in fact collected specific information on a possible invasion but largely ignored the warning, The Conversation reported.Evidence suggests that about a year ago Israeli analysts had a copy of the Hamas attack playbook, the Jericho Wall document.This detailed how Hamas fighters would breach the border using paragliders, drones and rockets, and what they would seek to attack.An intelligence unit had also observed a rehearsal exercise in Gaza City, and linked the document and exercise together.The analyst had actually shown remarkable insight when she suggested to her superiors that the rehearsal was not for a raid, but an invasion, according to evidence collected by the New York Times.This critical assessment was ignored for three key reasons:First, a belief that Hamas did not have the capabilities to carry out the attack; data was never shared with international partners Five Eyes (Australia, New Zealand, US, UK and Canada) or challenged within Israeli intelligence; and third, Israeli defences were considered to be too strong for Hamas.Despite these massive failures, Premier Netanyahu has refused to accept any responsibility for the massacre, instead placing the blame, rightly or wrongly, on security officials. He has also deflected calls for a full investigation, while the Gaza war rages on.Following the Munich massacre in 1972, Israel's prime minister, Golda Meir, responded by authorizing Operation Wrath of God, a targeted assassination campaign against Black September operatives.But things would go terribly wrong, shortly after.In the post-Munich operation, in 1973, Israeli assassins mistook a Moroccan waiter, Ahmed Bouchikhi, for Ali Hassan Salameh, a security aide to PLO leader Yasser Arafat.They killed Bouchikhi in the Norwegian ski resort of Lillehammer and Norwegian authorities soon discovered Israel was behind the killing, leading to the exposure of Israel’s intelligence network across Europe.Mossad veterans openly acknowledge that assassinations are not a magic bullet and never have been, according to Dan Raviv, a former CBS News correspondent and co-author of “Spies Against Armageddon: Inside Israel’s Secret Wars.”“They admit that everyone that’s been assassinated has been replaced,” he said. “They acknowledge it’s not a solution to the Middle East conflict.”But they say that Israel, at a minimum, needs to take similar action as it did after the murders in Munich — to send a message to its adversaries, Raviv said.“They believe Oct. 7 was much bigger and truly deserves a massive response at so many levels,” he said.Mossad's chief, David Barnea, has vowed to pursue all those involved in the Oct. 7 assault, “directly or indirectly,” including “planners and envoys.”“Let every Arab mother know that if her son took part in the massacre — he signed his own death warrant,” Barnea said.“It’ll take time, as it took time after the Munich massacre, but we will put our hands on them wherever they are.”
