14 August 2024

Haniyeh’s Killing Could Boomerang and Help Iran

Binar FK

At an emergency summit Wednesday in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, members of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation issued a robust statement condemning the assassination of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran the previous week.

The statement by the 57-member group held “Israel, the illegal occupying power, fully responsible for this heinous attack” and called it “a serious infringement” of Iran’s sovereignty.

Iran has often been at odds with its fellow Muslim-majority countries — particularly the wealthy Sunni Arab states across the Persian Gulf – for interfering in their internal affairs. But Iran has also shown that it can benefit from chaos. Thus, the killing of Haniyeh – in a government guesthouse just hours after the Hamas leader had attended the inauguration of Iran’s new president – could allow Iran to increase its regional influence by harnessing Arab outrage at Israel and fostering Sunni-Shi’ite convergence.

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