The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced on Saturday that it had killed Saeed Izadi, a senior Iranian commander who played a crucial role in coordinating with Hamas. According to the IDF, Izadi was “one of the orchestrators” of the October 7, 2023, attack on southern Israel, which killed about 1,200 people and saw many others taken to Gaza as hostages.
IDF chief Eyal Zamir described the killing as a “key point in the conflict” and stated, “The blood of thousands of Israelis is on his hands.” He further added that it was a “tremendous intelligence and operational achievement”.
Izadi was reportedly in charge of the Palestine Corps of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps’s (IRGC) Quds Force, responsible for handling ties with Palestinian armed groups. The IDF claimed that Izadi was instrumental in arming and financing Hamas and had been responsible for military coordination between senior IRGC commanders and Hamas leaders.
The IDF said it had killed Izadi in a strike on an apartment in Qom, south of Tehran, in the early hours of Saturday. This is not the first time Izadi has been targeted by Israel; in April 2024, he narrowly survived an Israeli air strike targeting the Iranian consulate in Damascus, Syria, which killed several high-ranking Quds Force commanders.
Israel also claimed to have killed another Quds Force commander, Behnam Shahriyari, in a drone strike as he was traveling in a car through western Iran. Shahriyari was reportedly responsible for transporting missiles and rockets to Iran’s proxy groups across the region, including Hamas in Gaza and Hezbollah in Lebanon.
The attacks come as the conflict between Israel and Iran entered its ninth day, with both sides launching new attacks on Saturday. Iran claimed that Israel had targeted a nuclear facility near the city of Isfahan, while Israel said it was targeting military infrastructure in southwest Iran and reported at least one impact from Iranian drones that entered its airspace.
Iran’s Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told reporters in Istanbul that any US involvement in the conflict would be “very very dangerous”. He also stated that Iran would not resume talks over its nuclear program until Israel’s strikes stopped. US President Donald Trump has suggested US involvement in Israel’s strikes on Iran, saying Tehran had a “maximum” of two weeks to avoid possible American air strikes if they did not negotiate on their nuclear program.
According to Iranian officials, at least 430 people, including military commanders, have been killed and 3,500 injured in Iran since the conflict began on June 13. A human rights group tracking Iran, the Human Rights Activists News Agency, put the unofficial death toll at 657 on Friday. In Israel, officials say 25 people have been killed, including one due to a heart attack.