Kuala Lumpur: Malaysian police on Monday released composite images of two suspects who gunned down a Palestinian engineer and said they appeared to be European or Middle Eastern, fuelling suspicion that the slaying was an assassination by the Israeli regime.
Gaza’s ruling Hamas movement has accused the regime in Tel Aviv of being behind Saturday’s killing of Fadi Al Batsh, an important member of Hamas. The regime has neither confirmed nor denied its involvement.
Malaysian national police chief Mohammad Fuzi Haroun said the composite images were based on eyewitness descriptions. He said the suspects, clad in black jackets, were fair-skinned, well-built and had beards, and were likely European or Middle Eastern.
Fuzi said the images were displayed at all exit points in the country but said it was unclear if the men had fled Malaysia.
Police said the 34-year-old Al Batsh was hit with 14 bullets by the two assailants who shot from a motorbike as he was heading to a mosque for dawn prayers in a suburb near Kuala Lumpur. Police said closed-circuit television footage showed the suspects had waited for him for almost 20 minutes.
Hamas initially stopped short of blaming the Israeli regime, saying only that he had been “assassinated by the hand of treachery”. But later its top leader accused the regime’s Mossad intelligence agency of killing him and threatened retaliation.
Several Israeli minsters welcomed his killing. Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman estimated in radio interviews Sunday that Al Batsh may have been killed as part of a rivalry between Palestinian militants.
The Israeli regime has a long history of suspected targeting of Palestinians in overseas operations around the globe and has been linked to other assassinations as well, though it has rarely publicly acknowledged them.
The prevailing sentiment is that Mossad was indeed behind the latest slaying.
Police have said Al Batsh had lived in Malaysia for more than seven years and was a permanent resident of the country. He had a degree in electrical engineering and lectured at a local university, but police couldn’t confirm reports that Al Batsh was an expert in rocket making.
Al Batsh travelled locally and abroad to speak on Palestinian issues and was due to fly to Turkey for a conference when he was killed, police said.
