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JEDDAH: The Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) has warned that the killing of Hamas political leader Ismail Haniyeh risks tipping the Middle East into “wider conflict.”
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The comments came from Gambian Foreign Minister Mamadou Tangara, who currently chairs the 57-member OIC, during a meeting in the Saudi coastal city of Jeddah on Wednesday.
Iranian and Palestinian officials had called for the OIC gathering, saying the body needed to respond to Haniyeh’s death last week in Tehran.
“This heinous act serves only to escalate the existing tensions potentially leading to a wider conflict that could involve the entire region,” Tangara told the meeting.
He said Haniyeh’s killing “will not quell the Palestinian cause but rather it amplifies it, underscoring the urgency for justice and human rights for the Palestinian people.”
Iran’s acting foreign minister, Ali Bagheri, told the OIC that in the absence of action by the UN Security Council, “the Islamic Republic of Iran has no choice but to use its inherent right to legitimate defence against the aggressions of this regime.”
Hamas’s Lebanese ally Hezbollah has also pledged to retaliate for Haniyeh’s killing and that of its military commander Fuad Shukr in an Israeli strike in Beirut hours earlier.
The OIC meeting came amid growing tensions in the region following the recent escalation of violence in Gaza, which has resulted in the deaths of almost 40,000 people, mostly civilians.
On the sidelines of the OIC gathering, Deputy Prime Minister Mohammad Ishaq Dar of Pakistan met with Malaysia’s Foreign Minister, Dato’ Seri Utama Haji Mohamad. They discussed bilateral relations and cooperation in various fields.
Dar also met with Iran’s Acting Foreign Minister Ali Bagheri Kani, and the two officials discussed bilateral and regional issues of mutual interest, with a focus on developments in the Middle East.
