Who assassinated Mabhouh’s aide?

Hamas is claiming that the Mossad was behind it, Jordanian newspapers claim that it was a Jordanian citizen "assassinated by unknown assailants," and Ehud Barak responded this morning that the person was no saint
Tal Inbar |

Mahmoud al-Mabhouh’s aide, Kamal Ranaja, also known as Nizzar Abu-Mujhad, was assassinated in his Damascus apartment yesterday by unknown assailants. A Hamas official has blamed Israel for the assassination, stating, “Mossad was responsible, briefcases were taken from his house.”

A Lebanese news channel affiliated with Iran and Syria reported that Ranaja was a senior official in Hamas’s military wing and served as the aide to Mahmoud al-Mabhouh – a Hamas senior official who oversaw the layout responsible for smuggling weapons from Iran to the Gaza Strip. Al-Mabhouh was assassinated two and a half years ago in Dubai.

Hamas has begun investigating who was behind the assassination. A Hamas official in Lebanon anonymously claimed that Israel’s Mossad was responsible for the assassination. The Jordanian newspaper Al-Sabil reported yesterday (Wednesday) that the assassinated senior official was a Jordanian citizen, and that his body was found in his apartment after having been murdered by unknown assailants.

Responding this morning to Ranaja’s assassination, Israel’s Minister of Defense Ehud Barak said in a Galei Tzahal radio interview that “according to what is being published, the man was no saint.”