Nobody Can Lay A Hand On a Country That Is Strong, Gadkari says While Recounting Meeting With Hamas Leader Hours Before Assassination

New Delhi: While highlighting the importance of a nation to be strong both technologically and militarily, Union transport minister Nitin Gadkari recounted how he met Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh hours before his assassination in Tehran, Iran, in 2024.

The minister described how he encountered Haniyeh only hours before the Hamas leader was assassinated in a heavily guarded military complex in the Iranian capital.

He had travelled to Iran at the request of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who asked him to represent India at the swearing-in ceremony of Iran’s newly elected president, Masoud Pezeshkian, Gadkari said.

Ahead of the ceremony, he was present at a five-star hotel in Tehran where heads of state and senior dignitaries from multiple countries had gathered informally over tea and coffee, the minister recounted.

“All the heads of various nations were present, but one person who wasn’t a head of state was Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh. I met him. I saw him going to the swearing-in ceremony along with the president and the chief justice,” Gadkari said.

“After the swearing-in ceremony, I returned to my hotel, but around 4 am, the Iranian ambassador to India came to me and said we had to leave. I asked what happened, and he told me that the Hamas chief had been assassinated. I was shocked and asked how it happened, and he said, ‘I don’t know yet,’” the minister added.

Iranian authorities later confirmed that the assassination had taken place around 1.15 am on July 31. Haniyeh was staying in a highly secure military complex under the supervision of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, or Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). His bodyguard was also killed in the attack.

Gadkari told the audience that even now, there remains uncertainty about how the Hamas leader was killed, NDTV has reported.

“Some people say he was killed because he used his mobile phone. Some say it happened in some other way,” the minister said.

He then went on to say that if a country is strong, “no country can lay a hand on it.”

Citing Israel as an example, Gadkari said that it is a small state that has asserted global influence through technological sophistication and military capability.

The IRGC had said then that a short-range missile had been used to target the building where Haniyeh was staying.

A report in the Telegraph, however, said Israel’s Mossad enlisted Iranian security agents to plant explosives inside the building where Haniyeh was staying.

The report said the original plan had been to assassinate Haniyeh during an earlier visit to Tehran in May, when he attended the funeral of former Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi. That operation was reportedly abandoned due to the size of the crowds, which officials feared would increase the risk of failure or exposure.