DOHA/TEHRAN -- A funeral was held for Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh in Qatar on Friday, as mosques across several countries hosted commemoration ceremonies for the assassinated leader.
Haniyeh’s coffin was placed in a mosque in the Qatari capital Doha for his funeral prayer on Friday, a day after a massive procession led by Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei drew millions in Tehran.
Hamas deputy leader Khalil Al-Hayya led the funeral ceremony which was held after Muslim Friday prayers. Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani and Prime Minister Sheikh Muhammad bin Abdulrahman Al Thani were in attendance.
After funeral prayers, worshippers, some carrying Palestinian flags, chanted against the occupying regime of Israel and in support of Palestinians. Haniyeh was buried later in Lusail.
Funeral prayers were held in Turkey, Indonesia, Pakistan, Yemen and other countries for Haniyeh.
In Iran, hundreds of thousands of mourners attended a funeral ceremony in Tehran and paid respects to Haniyeh on Thursday with calls for revenge.
Ayatollah Khamenei led prayers for Haniyeh, after pledging a “harsh punishment” for his assassination. The Leader said after Haniyeh’s assassination that it was “our duty to seek revenge for his blood as he was martyred in the territory of the Islamic Republic of Iran.”
In Tehran’s city centre, crowds, including women shrouded in black, carried posters of Haniyeh and Palestinian flags in a procession and ceremony that began at Tehran University.
Iran’s Islamic Revolution Guards Corps announced the day before that Haniyeh and his bodyguard were assassinated in a pre-dawn strike Wednesday on their accommodation in Tehran.
It came just hours after Israel assassinated a top Hezbollah commander, Fuad Shukr, in the south of Lebanon’s capital Beirut, raising fears of a wider regional conflict as the Zionist regime’s genocidal war on Gaza continues.  
Senior Iranian officials including President Masoud Pezeshkian and IRGC chief, General Hussein Salami, attended the ceremony for Haniyeh. Qatar-based Haniyeh had been visiting Tehran for Pezeshkian’s inauguration ceremony on Tuesday.
Khalil al-Hayya, Hamas’s foreign relations chief, vowed during the funeral ceremony that Haniyeh’s message will live on and “we will pursue Israel until it is uprooted from the land of Palestine”.
Pezeshkian later told Hayya that Iran “will continue to support with firmer determination the Axis of Resistance”, regional groups that include Hamas, Hezbollah, Yemen’s Ansarullah and Iraqis. 
The caskets, with a black-and-white pattern resembling a Palestinian keffiyeh scarf, were borne on a flower-decorated truck through city streets jammed with huge crowds of mourners cooled by water spray on a hot day.
Iran’s parliamentary speaker Muhammad Bagher Ghalibaf said, “It is our duty to respond at the right time and in the right place,” as crowds chanted “Death to Israel, Death to America!”
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the strikes in Tehran and Beirut represented a “dangerous escalation”. The UN Security Council convened an emergency meeting Wednesday at Iran’s request to discuss the incident.
In April, after a strike martyred IRGC advisors at its consulate in Damascus, Iran made its first ever direct attack on Zionist targets in the occupied territories, firing a barrage of drones and missiles.
“Iran has already proven it is capable and willing to launch a major attack on Israel,” White House National Security Communications Advisor John Kirby told MSNBC on Thursday.
He was referring to Operation True Promise, a multi-pronged attack that was launched by the Islamic Republic against the occupied territories on April 13. 
Kirby said “We must take Leader [of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Khamenei]’s warning about revenge seriously”.
The Reuters news agency, citing unnamed sources, said top Iranian officials would meet the representatives of resistance groups from Lebanon, Iraq and Yemen on Thursday to discuss retaliation against Israel. 
“Iran and the resistance members will conduct a thorough assessment after the meeting in Tehran to find the best and most effective way to retaliate against the Zionist regime (Israel),” it quoted what it described as a senior Iranian official, with direct knowledge of the meeting.  
“How Iran and the resistance front will respond is currently being reviewed ... This will certainly happen and the Zionist regime will undoubtedly regret it,” General Muhammad Bagheri, Iran’s armed forces chief of staff, told national TV Thursday.
“All fronts of the resistance will take revenge for Haniyeh’s blood,” Ali Akbar Ahmadian, the secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, told Mehr news agency.
On April 13, Iran launched hundreds of missiles and drones at Israel in retaliation for the Zionist regime’s strike on the Iranian consular section in Damascus on April 1.
“Iran’s response to the assassination of Martyr Haniyeh will be stronger than before,” former senior IRGC commander Esmail Kosari told national TV.