Skip to main content
Live blog update| Israel's war on Gaza

Hamas leaders assassinated by Israel in the past

Israel has assassinated several Hamas leaders over the last 25 years:

  • January 1996: Israel assassinated Hamas military leader Yahya Ayyash in Gaza’s Beit Lahiya
  • March 2004: Hamas spiritual leader and founder Sheikh Ahmed Yasin was killed by an Israeli strike in Gaza
  • April 2004: Yasin’s successor and Hamas co-founder Abdel Aziz al-Rantisi was killed by Israeli helicopter missile strike in Gaza City
  • January 2024: Senior Hamas official Saleh al-Arouri was killed in an Israeli drone strike in Beirut 
  • July 2024: Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’s political chief, assassinated in Iran’s capital, Tehran