ERBIL, Kurdistan Region of Iraq – Israel’s defense minister on Wednesday claimed to have killed Iranian Intelligence Minister Esmaeil Khatib in an airstrike in Tehran, while Iran has yet to confirm the reports.

Israel’s Defense Minister Israel Katz announced that Khatib had been “eliminated” in an airstrike on Tuesday night.

“He was in charge of the regime's internal murder and oppression system in Iran and of promoting external threats,” affiliated media quoted the Israeli minister as saying.

Iran has yet to confirm or deny the reports about the intelligence minister’s death.

Born in 1961, Iranian cleric and politician Khatib has served as the Islamic Republic’s intelligence minister since August 2021.

The announcement follows confirmation of the assassination of Ali Larijani, secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council (SNSC), as well as Gholamreza Soleimani, commander of the Basij unit of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), on Tuesday.

The developments come amid an ongoing war in the Middle East after joint US-Israeli airstrikes targeted Iranian territory in late February, prompting retaliatory Iranian strikes that escalated into a war now in its third week.

Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei was also assassinated at the beginning of the offensives, alongside several high-ranking officials and commanders within the Islamic Republic.

There are also unconfirmed reports that the newly appointed Supreme Leader Mojtaba Khamenei has suffered injuries in an airstrike.