Fri, 16 Jan 2009 10:40:21 GMT
 Hamas interior minister, Said Siam, was killed on Thursday in Gaza by an Israeli airstrike. |
Hamas Interior Minister, Said Siam, was killed on Thursday in Gaza by an Israeli airstrike.
Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said in a message that the assassination of Hamas' key figures was put on Israel's agenda after "the Zionist criminals faced the Palestinian people's strong resistance in the Gaza Strip during the past twenty days."
The 50-year-old Siam was one of the Hamas movement's top five leaders in the Gaza Strip, overseeing the police and other security forces.
Hamas assumed power in Palestinian political arena after the group won an overwhelming victory in parliamentary elections in 2006.
Since the beginning of the Israeli offensive against Gaza on December 27, more than 1,105 Palestinians - many of them women and children - have been killed and nearly 5,100 others injured.
Siam was active in the first Palestinian uprising against Israel, which erupted in 1987. Israeli forces detained Siam repeatedly in the 1990s, and in 1992 exiled him for a year to southern Lebanon with hundreds of other Hamas leaders.
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