Live updates: Iranian Intelligence Minister killed, Israel says
Israel’s protection minister Israel Katz made the announcement on Wednesday.
The killing of Esmail Khatib follows the killings of prime Iranian safety officer Ali Larijani and the top of the paramilitary Revolutionary Guard’s all-volunteer Basij pressure.
Katz stated that “significant surprises are expected throughout this day on all the fronts,” with out elaborating.
The US Treasury, which sanctioned Khatib in 2022 over the Intelligence Ministry “engaging in cyber-enabled activities against the United States and its allies” put his 12 months of beginning as both 1960 or 1961.
It stated Khatib had been born in Ghayenat in Iran’s South Khorasan Province.
Khatib “directs several networks of cyber threat actors involved in cyber espionage and ransomware attacks in support of Iran’s political goals,” the Treasury stated on the time.
“In addition to conducting malicious cyber activity that affected Albanian government websites, (Intelligence Ministry) cyber actors were also responsible for the leaking of documents purported to be from the Albanian government and personal information associated with Albanian residents.”
The Treasury additionally known as Iran’s Intelligence Ministry in one other spherical of sanctions “one of the Iranian government’s main security services which is responsible for serious human rights abuses.”
“Under his leadership, the (Intelligence Ministry) has cracked down on a large number of human rights defenders, women-rights activists, journalists, filmmakers, and members of religious minority groups,” he stated.
The Intelligence Ministry “has also aggressively persecuted individuals reporting on human rights abuses and violations in Iran, as well as their families, and subjected detainees to torture in secret detention centers during his tenure.”
In June 2025, Khatib claimed Iran seized paperwork from Israel’s nuclear program.
The head of the International Atomic Energy Agency later stated that the data Iran claimed it seized relating to Israel’s nuclear program “seems to refer” to the nation’s Soreq Nuclear Research Center.
Soreq, situated 20 kilometers (12 miles) south of Tel Aviv, is a nationwide laboratory for nuclear science established in Israel in 1958, engaged in nuclear science, radiation security and utilized physics.
Khatib was a Shiite cleric who labored in quite a lot of positions in Iran’s judiciary and the Intelligence Ministry. He served within the Revolutionary Guard within the Iran-Iraq battle within the Nineteen Eighties and was wounded in fight.
Iran didn’t instantly acknowledge Khatib’s dying as Iranian state tv aired reside footage of a funeral procession for prime Iranian safety official Ali Larijani, in addition to the slain head of the Revolutionary Guard’s all-volunteer Basij pressure and others, in Tehran.
Thousands throned to the processional as Larijani’s physique and his son, additionally killed in an Israeli strike, stood previous on a mattress of a semitruck adorned with photographs of the useless.
People waved Iranian flags on the funeral.
Iran has more and more turned towards giant, pro-government occasions within the battle as Israeli airstrikes proceed to kill the theocracy’s prime leaders, together with the late Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei when the battle started Feb. 28.
In saying killing Khatib, the Israeli army described the Intelligence Ministry as having “advanced intelligence capabilities” and conducting operations worldwide, together with these towards Israel.
“Khatib played a significant role during the recent protests throughout Iran, both with regards to the arrest and killing of protesters as well as shaping the regime’s intelligence assessment,” the Israeli army stated. “Similarly, he operated against Iranian citizens during the Mahsa Amini protests.”
