RAMALLAH, Jan. 31 (JMCC) - One day after the Islamic movement Hamas announced it would open an investigation into security breaches leading to the death of a top commander, details began to emerge about his last hours.
Mahmoud Mabhouh traveled to Dubai on Hamas business, reported the National. He used his real passport, and arrived in the United Arab Emirates without his usual security detail.
One day after he checked into his hotel room, it appears that Mabhouh was accosted and either drugged or poisoned. While family members reported signed of electrocution and strangulation, a lab report of the 50-year-old's blood indicated that he had been injected with poison that induced a heart attack, reported the London Times. Documents he was carrying were reportedly photographed,
Hamas officials said that this was the second attempt to assassinate Mabhouh in three months, and that the Mossad was certainly involved.
A confidante of Mabhouh said that he had been recently angered when the Hamas movement filmed him speaking about the operation in which he kidnapped two Israeli soldiers without obscuring his face or voice, reports Ynet.
In a Saturday interview with the satellite television channel al-Jazeera, Hamas leader Osama Hamdan indicated that Hamas would think carefully before retaliating against Israel overseas.
Nevertheless, analysts fear that the killling of Mabhouh in the relatively-calm Dubai could spark a new international dimmension in Hamas' fight against Israel, reports Xinua.