This article was originally published by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and is reprinted with permission.
Former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has said that the killing of Ismail Haniyeh, the political leader of the EU- and U.S.-designated Palestinian terrorist organization Hamas, will not influence the peace process toward ending the Israeli-Hamas war “because peace is not on the agenda at this point.”
Olmert told RFE/RL’s Radio Farda in an interview on July 31 that Iran’s response to the killing will be shaped by Tehran’s belief that Israel carried out the attack, regardless of the fact that Israel has not claimed responsibility.
“Whether we did it or not is less important,” said Olmert, who was heavily involved in unsuccessful efforts to work out a two-state solution with the Palestinian Authority while serving as prime minister from 2006 to 2009. “It’s what they [Iran] think happened that will probably determine their reaction.”
Haniyeh’s death on Iranian territory and Israel’s targeting of Tehran-backed groups involved in attacks against Israel have sparked fears of a direct conflict between Iran and Israel and a broader Middle East conflict.
In a July 31 post on Telegram, Hamas announced that the 62-year-old Haniyeh was killed in an “air strike on his residence in Tehran.” Haniyeh, who headed Hamas’s political headquarters in Qatar, was in the Iranian capital with other leaders of Iran’s “axis of resistance” opposing Israel to attend the July 30 the inauguration of newly elected President Masud Pezeshkian.
While Israel has not commented on the incident, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has vowed revenge against Israel over the killing. The New York Times, citing Iranian officials, reported that Khamenei ordered a direct strike against Israel during an emergency meeting of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council on July 31. Pezeshkian said in a July 31 statement that Iran “will defend its territorial integrity” after the attack, without providing details.
Haniyeh was heavily involved in internationally brokered talks on reaching a permanent cease-fire to the war between Israel and Hamas in the Gaza Strip. The 10-month war, sparked by a deadly assault on Israel on October 7 launched by Hamas and other Palestinian extremist groups, has killed nearly 40,000 people, mostly civilians, according to health officials in Gaza.
Haniyeh’s killing came just a day after Israel said it had killed Fuad Shukr, a commander of the Iranian proxy Lebanese Hizballah, which Israel said was behind a July 28 rocket attack in the Israeli-controlled Golan Heights that killed 12 Israeli youths.
Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) confirmed on August 1 that Shukr was killed in Beirut in strikes Israel said it had launched against Hizballah targets in Lebanon.
Israel has described the July 28 attack as the deadliest since the October 7 assault by Hamas in which 1,200 Israelis were killed and hundreds were taken hostage.
Israel vowed to wipe out Hamas’s leadership after the October 7 assault and has demanded the return of Israeli hostages held in Gaza by Hamas.
Haniyeh, who was a U.S.-designated terrorist and was seen in a video released by Hamas celebrating the success of the October 7 assault, was a marked man. But he was also seen as a relative moderate compared to those in Hamas’s militant wing and was key to securing a cease-fire, the release of Israeli hostages, and a possible peace deal.
Former Israeli Prime Minister Olmert downplayed the impact Haniyeh’s death will have on any peace negotiations.
“I don’t think that it will in any way influence the chances for peace, because peace is not on the agenda altogether at this point,” Olmert told Radio Farda. “It may create some more difficulties in the process of reaching an agreement about the hostages.”
Olmert served as prime minister as a member of the hard-line Likud party currently chaired by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. During his time in office he endorsed the Arab peace initiative to end the longstanding Arab-Israeli conflict and was a supporter of a two-state solution to the Gaza crisis.
In 2006, a member of Olmert’s cabinet said that an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities was “unavoidable” considering the apparent failure of international sanctions to deny Iran technology that could be used to develop a nuclear weapon. A spokesperson for Olmert subsequently said that “all options must remain on the table” and that more could be done to put financial pressure on Tehran.
In 2012, then-former Prime Minister Olmert opposed the idea of strikes against Iran’s controversial nuclear facilities.
Speaking to Radio Farda on July 31, Olmert said that the “Iranians will look for a way to react to the elimination of Ismail Haniyeh.”
However, he said that the fact that the Israeli government did not officially take responsibility for his killing will influence the “extremity of the Iranian reaction.”
“I think it will be somewhat more moderate than under different circumstances,” Olmert said.
Olmert expressed hope that an expected Iranian response would not spark a broader Middle East war directly pitting Iran against Israel, saying that retaliation beyond a direct retaliatory attack launched by Iran in April would be a “mistake.”
Iran and its partners and proxies launched hundreds of drones and missiles against Israeli territory on April 13-14 in retaliation for an attack that Tehran said Israel carried out earlier that month against an Iranian Embassy compound.
Seven IRGC members, including top commanders, were killed in the April 1 strike, which Israel did not take responsibility for. The Iranian retaliatory attack caused little damage, with most of the Iranian missiles and drones shot down or otherwise failing to reach their targets.
After Iran reported downing a handful of small drones over the central city of Isfahan on April 19, which again was seen as a likely Israeli counterstrike for which it did not claim responsibility, fears of a wider conflict died down somewhat when Iran’s muted response was taken as an attempt to avert further escalation.
“I’m not certain that this is entirely in the interest of Iran and they may live to regret every such action,” Olmert said. “I think that the lesson they should have learned from the April confrontation is that even when you shoot hundreds of ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, drones, others, you are not going to cause such damage that you have planned to make, and you lose your deterrence, and you lose the power of your threat.”
