(JNi.media) Iran has canceled a planned visit by a delegation from Hamas in Tehran, following the visit by Hamas leader Khaled Meshal in Saudi Arabia last month, the new Huffington Post Arabic edition reported Sunday.
The website reported that senior Iranian Revolutionary Guards officials have met with Hamas representatives in an undisclosed Arab capital, to express Tehran’s fury, in what ended up being a “stormy meeting.”
Iran believes that Saudi Arabia has initiated the move against it because of the Saudis’ opposition to the nuclear agreement with the superpowers. The Iranian officials protested the fact that Meshal, who has avoided visiting Iran for years, immediately accepted the Saudi invitation.
This part may not be accurate. According to Al-Monitor, citing the deputy chairman of Hamas’ political bureau, Ismail Haniyeh, Meshal timed his trip to Saudi Arabia carefully, with secret arrangements several months in advance. Hamas waited for the right opportunity to accept the Saudi invitation.
One Hamas delegate to Saudi Arabia told Al-Monitor that “Meshal and his colleagues had discussed with Saudi officials the development of the relationship between [Hamas and Saudi Arabia], which has seen in recent months a positive and gradual improvement. Hamas showed serious interest in bringing the Saudi role back into the Palestinian arena, to bring together Fatah and Hamas’ views, as Hamas also updated Saudi Arabia on the developments of the truce with Israel.”
A Palestinian source confirmed that the leadership in Tehran is furious with Hamas.
Senior Hamas member Khalil al-Hayya warned that if Iran gives up its support for the Palestinian resistance, it would lose a card it’s been waving it for decades. He insisted there is no disconnect between Iran and Hamas, even though Iran’s support for Hamas ceased long ago.
Despite the cooling of the relationship, Hassan Yousef, a senior Hamas figure in Judea and Samaria, told Hamas journal Al-Rai that the visit of the Hamas delegation in Iran is still on the agenda, and has not been canceled altogether.