Shortly after 3:46 p.m. Doha time on September 9, Osama Hamdan received a call from a journalist asking him if he knew anything about the explosion that had just taken place in the Qatari capital. The senior Hamas leader was at a meeting across town from the Islamic resistance movement’s offices on Wadi Rawdan Street in the upscale Legtaifiyah District. He had not heard a sound. “There was an explosion in Doha,” Hamdan recalled the journalist telling him. “I think your people were targeted.” Hamdan began calling other Hamas officials. “No one is answering. All the phones [were] out of order,” Hamdan recalled. “After around five minutes, one of the brothers came to me and he said, ‘There was an airstrike against the office.’”
As Hamdan made his way to the scene, Israeli officials began telling media outlets that Israel had conducted a series of airstrikes aimed at assassinating top Hamas officials. “The members of the leadership who were attacked led the activity of the terrorist organization for years, and were directly responsible for the massacre of October 7, and directed the war against the State of Israel,” the military said in a statement. Israel said the bombing was intended to kill the head of Hamas in Gaza, Dr. Khalil Al-Hayya. “We are waiting to see the results of the attack,” one official said. ….more
