Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz has announced the killing of Iran’s intelligence minister, Esmaeil Khatib.
Katz, speaking during a military briefing, stated that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has now authorized the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) to “eliminate any senior Iranian figure” without further cabinet approval.
Khatib was “responsible for the regime’s internal repression and assassination apparatus, as well as for advancing external threats,” Israel Katz said during a situation assessment.
“Israel’s policy is unequivocal: no one in Iran has immunity — everyone is a target.
“This is seen as another success from the Israeli perspective in targeting the Iranian leadership,” Katz said
Meanwhile, there has been no immediate response from Iran, whose top national security official, Ali Larijani, and former Basij militia chief Gen. Gholam Reza Soleiman, were confirmed killed by Iranian authorities yesterday after Israel announced their deaths.
Pan-Atlantic Kompass reports that Esmail Khatib was appointed as Iran’s intelligence minister by the late former president, Ebrahim Raisi, back in 2021.
He studied Islamic jurisprudence under multiple high-ranking clerics, including Iran’s late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.
He has held senior posts in the Ministry of Intelligence and the Office of the Supreme Leader.
He was sanctioned by the U.S Treasury for his role as head of Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence “for engaging in cyber-enabled activities against the United States and its allies” in 2022.
Khatib is reported to have joined the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in 1980, shortly after the 1979 Islamic Revolution.
If the killing of Iran’s intelligence minister announced on Wednesday is confirmed, it would be the third assassination of high-ranking Iranian leaders in two days.
Iranian security chief Ali Larijani and Gholamreza Soleimani, head of the Basij paramilitary force, were killed in Israeli air strikes on Tuesday. Iran will hold funerals on Wednesday for both men.
While there has been official confirmation of the killing of Iran’s intelligence minister from Tehran, its foreign minister insisted that Larijani’s killing will not deal a fatal blow to Iran’s leadership.
In an interview with Al Jazeera aired after the killing of Larijani was confirmed by Tehran early on Wednesday, Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said the United States and Israel had yet to realise that Iran’s government does not rely on a single individual.
Larijani had been one of Iran’s most influential political operators, having previously led its nuclear negotiations with the West and served as speaker of parliament.
The killings are part of a pattern of leadership targeting that Israel has pursued across its network of adversaries.
Numerous Hamas leaders inside and outside of Gaza have been assassinated, following a pattern of years of targeting Palestinian leaders stretching back decades.
Hezbollah’s long-time leader Hassan Nasrallah and a former Houthi prime minister Ahmed Rahawi, have both been killed, and Israeli officials have signalled that such strikes will continue.
Since launching its offensive on February 28, Israel and the United States have systematically removed much of Iran’s top tier of military and political leadership, including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who was killed on the opening day of the war, along with several family members.
Recall also that after the killing of Khamenei, his son, Mojtaba Khamenei has been appointed as Iran’s Supreme Leader.
However, Russia is among the first countries to condemn the killings of senior Iranian officials.
Moscow is against the killing of Iran’s leadership figures, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Wednesday.
“We certainly condemn actions aimed at causing harm to the health, or even more so, the murder and liquidation of representatives of the leadership of sovereign Iran, sovereign and independent Iran, as well as other countries. We condemn such actions,” Peskov told reporters in a briefing earlier today.
Asked about a Wall Street Journal report citing people familiar with the matter that Russia has been expanding its intelligence sharing and military cooperation with Iran, providing satellite imagery and improved drone technology to aid Tehran’s targeting of U.S. forces in the region, Peskov told reporters: “There are currently lots of different reports circulating about this war. The vast majority are nothing more than fake news.”
