Iran's intelligence minister Esmail Khatib killed in air strike

Masoud Pezeshkian said the "cowardly assassination" had left Iran "in deep mourning", after Israel said on Wednesday it had killed Khatib in an air strike.

It comes a day after Israel announced it had killed Iran's top security official, Ali Larijani, and head of the paramilitary Basij force, Gholamreza Soleimani, in strikes.

Since the assassination of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on the first day of the war on 28 February, multiple senior Iranian officials and commanders have been killed in efforts by Israel and the US to weaken the regime's leadership.

In a post on X, Pezeshkian extended his condolences to the Iranian people over the officials' deaths, adding he was "certain their path will continue more steadfastly than before".

"It might be that when people come out after a call to protest, the likelihood of them being killed is lower now," she said. "Even though they all have replacements, these were the main figures."

Earlier on Wednesday, Israel's defence minister Israel Katz announced that Khatib had been "eliminated" in an Israeli strike on Tehran.

"Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and I have authorised the IDF to eliminate any senior Iranian official for whom the intelligence and operational circle has been closed, without the need for additional approval," he said.

In a statement, the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) said Iran's Ministry of Intelligence had been instrumental in supporting the regime's "repression and terrorist activities" and Khatib had played a "significant role" in the "arrest and killing of protesters" during the crackdown on recent protests in Iran.

Khatib was appointed as Iran's defence minister by the late former president, Ebrahim Raisi, in 2021.

He studied Islamic jurisprudence under several high-ranking clerics, including Khamenei, and held various senior posts in the ministry of intelligence and Office of the Supreme Leader.

He was sanctioned by the US Treasury for his role as head of Iran's Ministry of Intelligence for "engaging in cyber-enabled activities against the United States and its allies" in 2022.

Large crowds gathered in central Tehran on Wednesday for the funerals of Larijani, Soleimani, and the 84 sailors killed when the US sank an Iranian warship off the coast of Sri Lanka earlier this month.

More than 1,300 people have been killed in Israeli and US strikes on Iran since the start of the war, including 226 women and 204 children, according to the Iranian government.

The US-based Human Rights Activists News Agency (Hrana) puts the death toll higher - reporting on Tuesday that at least 1354 civilians and 1138 military personnel have been killed since the war began, as well 622 others who it could not classify.

Iran has retaliated with strikes across the Middle East. On Wednesday, two people were killed in a strike on Israel, and blasts and drone interceptions were reported in Dubai, Qatar, Kuwait, Iraq, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia.

The reverberations of the war have been felt across the world with oil prices surging following the effective closure of the Strait of Hormuz, a vital waterway for energy shipments.

Additional reporting by Ghoncheh Habibiazad

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