Mural honoring Ismail Haniyeh unveiled in Tehran

TEHRAN- On the second anniversary of the martyrdom of Ismail Haniyeh, the former chief of the political bureau of the Palestinian Resistance Movement Hamas, a new mural was unveiled at the intersection of Jomhouri and Valiasr avenues in Tehran on Friday with the support of the Art Bureau.

The large-scale artwork is dominated by a deep blue backdrop, featuring a central, framed photograph of a fraternal embrace between the Martyred Leader of the Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, and Ismail Haniyeh. This central image is flanked by a series of waving Iranian and Palestinian flags.

The mural, designed and executed by artists Mohammad Amin Emami and Sina Ra'yat-doost, serves as a public tribute to Haniyeh’s legacy and the enduring resilience of the Palestinian people.

In recent years, the Art Bureau has increasingly utilized urban spaces to showcase visual arts as a means of responding to pivotal events within the Islamic world and the Axis of Resistance. By integrating art into the city's public landscape, the bureau aims to keep the narratives of struggle and liberation present in the daily lives of citizens.

Ismail Haniyeh was born in exile in 1963 in the central Gaza Strip’s Shati refugee camp. His parents were forcibly displaced by the Israeli military from their home in the town of Asqalan (now known as Ashkelon). This was to make way for Israeli settlers to move into his parents’ house following the Nakba of 1948.

He graduated in 1987 from the Islamic University of Gaza with a degree in Arabic literature and then obtained his Ph.D. from the same university in 2009.

Haniyeh began his activism against Israeli colonialism and occupation with the “Islamic Bloc” which represented the student arm of the Muslim Brotherhood in the Gaza Strip, from which the resistance movement Hamas emerged.

Haniyeh was arrested by the Israeli occupation authorities in 1989 and spent three years in prison. The Israelis then exiled him to Marj al-Zohour on the Lebanese - (Israeli-occupied) Palestinian border along with a group of Hamas leaders.

He returned to the Gaza Strip after being forced to spend a year in exile. Haniyah was appointed as a dean at the Islamic University in the enclave.

In 1997, he was appointed as head of the office of the founder of Hamas, Sheikh Ahmed Yassin. He was elected the chief of Hamas in the Gaza Strip following the assassination of Sheikh Yassin and his successor Dr. Abdel Aziz al-Rantisi in 2004.

In May 2017, Haniyah was elected as the head of the political bureau of Hamas, succeeding Khaled Meshaal, before leaving Gaza for exile in Qatar two years later.

As many as 60 relatives of Haniyah have been killed by the Israeli occupation forces since October 7, 2023. This is while Haniyah was a political leader and not a member of the armed wing of Hamas.

Haniyeh and one of his bodyguards, who had participated in the swearing-in ceremony of new Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian in Tehran, were assassinated in their residence in Tehran on July 31, 2024.

SAB/