Lieutenant General Dahi Khalfan Tamim, Chief of Dubai Police, reserved from giving details about the crime scene saying the cause of death is by suffocation.
Dubai: Police authorities in Dubai are still unyielding to reveal more information about the recent assassination of a senior Hamas military commander in a Dubai hotel.
Lieutenant General Dahi Khalfan Tamim, Chief of Dubai Police, reserved from giving details about the crime scene saying the cause of death is by suffocation. "Forensic examination point out that the deceased was suffocated with a pillow in his hotel room," he told Gulf News without commenting on whether he was electrocuted or tortured.
Mahmoud Al Mabhouh, 50, who managed to escape previous assassination attempts, was found killed in his hotel room a day after he arrived to the country. Dubai Police did not reveal the identities of the suspects.
"From our investigations and evidences collected from the crime scene, we have the identities of the people involved including the killer and the master mind behind this crime. It is a professional criminal group," he said.
Images
A security source said that surveillance cameras in the hotel captured the images of the suspects.
Hamas said the Israeli intelligence unit, Mossad, was behind the assassination of Mabhouh, one of the founders of Hamas' military wing, the Ezz Al Deen Al Qassam Brigades.
According to Lt Gen Dahi, they have send requests through the Interpol to get more information about the suspects and whether the passports they were carrying were authentic. Lt Gen Dahi refused to reveal the European countries they are approaching. He said he expects cooperation from the authorities.
"We are approaching all the channels including embassies and consulates to get more information on the suspects," he said.
"European countries don't extradite suspects but we will demand for the suspects to be tracked," he said.
"The big question to ask is how Hamas allowed such an important figure like Al Mabhouh travel without protection. He didn't have any escort or guard and they should have sought the assistance from the authorities in Dubai to provide him with security, " he said.
"If this is how they handle matters then they have no knowledge on security matters," he said.
When asked on the reasons for his presence in Dubai, he said, "I don't know. All we know is a Palestinian entered on a visit visa to the country. His last name, Al Mabhouh, was missing from his passport."
Mossad role?
Lt Gen Dahi did not confirm or deny whether the Mossad is behind the assassination of Al Mabhouh, as claimed by Hamas Movement, but referred to an article in Sharq Al Awsat quoting an article published in the Israeli daily newspaper, Yediot Ahronot.
"The Israeli expert, [Ron Ben Yishai] stated that indicators from the crime point out to the involvement of the Mossad in the operation," he said.
Al Mabhouh's brother, Fayed was qouted by AFP saying, "The first results of a joint investigation by Hamas and the UAE show he was killed by an electrical appliance that was held to his head. He was then strangled."
Israel has assassinated a senior Hamas military commander in Dubai who played a major role in a Palestinian uprising in the 1980s, an official in the Islamist group revealed today.
Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, who has been a target since engineering the capture of Israeli soldiers in the 1980s, was killed on January 20 - the day after he arrived in Dubai.
He was found dead in his hotel room in Dubai without any injuries to his body, a Palestinian source said.
He had barricaded the door of his room with chairs, a standard precaution by a man who felt that Israeli intelligence had been after his head for 20 years.
‘It seems that an autopsy was ordered and found traces of poison in his body,' a source said.
'Mabhouh was also ill. Hamas controls the information on this.
‘Being in Syria, Mabhouh was not directly involved in Hamas's military operations. He was one of their main military guys, although not a crucial figure.’
The death of Mabhouh, 50, lengthens Hamas's list of what it describes as ‘martyrs’, and constitutes another setback for the group, which has defied Israel and refuses to abandon its fight against the Jewish state.
Israeli officials were not prepared to comment.
Israel has killed dozens of leaders and military figures in Hamas, which was founded two decades ago as a religious resistance movement against Israeli occupation.
‘I cannot reveal the circumstances (of the killing). We are working with the authorities in the United Arab Emirates,’ said Izzat al-Rishq, who is a member of Hamas's politburo.
He added Mabhouh was an ‘important’ member of Izz el-Deen al- Qassam brigades, Hamas's military wing named after a Syrian religious leader who fought British colonial forces in Palestine in the 1930s.
Mabhouh was born in the Gaza Strip but had been living in Syria since 1989.
Syria and Iran are the main backers of Hamas, which controls the Gaza Strip.
Rishq, who lives in exile in Damascus, along with several of Hamas's main figures, said Mabhouh engineered the capture of two Israeli soldiers during the Palestinian uprising in the 1980s. The soldiers were later killed.
Mabhouh was imprisoned several times by Israeli forces. Israel razed his home in Gaza, Rishq added.
A diplomat in Damascus said it was too early to say if Mabhouh's past was linked to his death.
‘The Israelis have a long memory for sure, but one cannot draw conclusions yet. It might be easier for the Israelis to kill him in Dubai than in Damascus,’ the diplomat said.
The U.S., which has started a rapprochement with Damascus, wants Syrian authorities to help neutralise Hamas as an armed Middle East force.
Syria, which is seeking peace with Israel, resisted U.S. pressure several years ago to expel the Hamas leadership.
Hamas also has a presence in Lebanon.
A bomb in Beirut killed two of its members in December 2008.
'Assassinated': Mahmoud al-Mabhouh
Conflict: Air strike on January 5, 2009, as Israel intensified its ground assault against the Gaza Strip in an effort to put an end to Hamas rocket attacks
- The father of Hamas's Mahmoud Al Mabhouh holds up a family photo showing Al Mabhouh, at their home in the Jebaliya refugee camp, northern Gaza Strip.
Palestinian mourners attend the funeral of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, one of the founders of the Islamic movement's armed wing known as Izzedein al-Qassam Brigades, in Damascus, Syria, Jan. 29, 2010. Hamas vowed on Friday to retaliate the assassination of its top military commander Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai after it blamed Israel for his death.
Khaled Meshaal, the exiled leader of Hamas politburo, speaks during the funeral of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, one of the founders of the Islamic movement's armed wing known as Izzedein al-Qassam Brigades, in Damascus, Syria, Jan. 29, 2010. Hamas vowed on Friday to retaliate the assassination of its top military commander Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai after it blamed Israel for his death.
Palestinian mourners attend the funeral of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, one of the founders of the Islamic movement's armed wing known as Izzedein al-Qassam Brigades, in Damascus, Syria, Jan. 29, 2010. Hamas vowed on Friday to retaliate the assassination of its top military commander Mahmoud al-Mabhouh in Dubai after it blamed Israel for his
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