Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz on Monday publicly acknowledged for the first time that Israel killed Ismail Haniyeh, a top leader of the Palestinian militant group Hamas, in Iran’s Tehran in July, Reuters reported.

Katz made the remarks in a speech vowing to target the leaders of the Iran-backed Houthi movement in Yemen, BBC reported. The group has been launching missile and drone attacks on Israel for more than a year in view of Tel Aviv’s war on the besieged Palestinian territory of Gaza.

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The Houthis have vowed to continue its strikes on Israel until the war in Gaza ends.

Israel would “strike hard” at the Houthis and “decapitate” its leadership, BBC quoted Katz as saying on Monday. “Just as we did with Haniyeh, [Yahya] Sinwar, and [Hassan] Nasrallah in Tehran, Gaza, and Lebanon, we will do so in Hodeida and Sanaa [both cities in Yemen],” he added.

Sinwar, another Hamas leader, was killed in October. Nasrallah, who was the chief of the Lebanon-based militant group Hezbollah, was killed in September. Hezbollah is an ally of Hamas. Both organisations are backed by Iran.

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Haniyeh was killed in late July in “a treacherous Zionist raid on his residence in Tehran”, Hamas had said at the time. He had been leading the militant group’s political operations in recent years while in exile in Qatar and Turkey.

Haniyeh, widely considered as the top-most leader of Hamas, had played an important role in negotiations aimed at reaching a ceasefire in Gaza.

Israel’s military offensive against Gaza began on October 7, 2023, after Hamas launched an incursion into southern Israel, killing 1,200 persons and taking over 200 hostages. Israel has been carrying out unprecedented air and ground strikes on Gaza since then, killing more than 46,000 persons, including over 17,400 children.