Abdul aziz rantisi biography channel

He described himself as one of the seven founders of Hamas and was considered by many as second only in importance to the group’s crippled spiritual leader, Shaikh Ahmad Yasin.

Yasin was assassinated in a similar missile attack by Israel in March.

A paediatrician by training, Dr al-Rantisi was a popular figure in Gaza and defended any and all means that would force Israeli troops and illegal settlers to leave Palestine.

Background

A committed Islamist, al-Rantisi rose to prominence with Hamas during the first Palestinian Intifada in the late s and early s.

He was arrested by Israel several times, spending as much as two and a half years in prison on one occasion.

In late , the doctor was among more than Palestinians deported to Lebanon.

He became a spokesman for the deportees in his camp, Marj al-Zahur.

After his return to Gaza, he proved no more popular with Yasir Arafat’s Palestinian Authority than he had been with the Israeli gove

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Rantissi: An uncompromising figure

Abdel Aziz al-Rantissi, who was killed in an Israeli missile strike on 17 April, had been one of the most forceful spokesmen against compromise with Israel.

Rantissi took over the leadership of the militant Islamic movement Hamas in Gaza after the killing of the group's spiritual leader Sheikh Ahmed Yassin in March.

He consistently argued that Palestinians have a right to resist Israel by any and all means, including the suicide bombing of civilians.

"They are not terrorism," he said of such attacks.

"They are a response to Israeli terrorism, individual and governmental, against Palestinian civilians," he told the Arabic newspaper Kut al-Arab in

Rantissi described himself as one of seven founders of Hamas.

Khaled Meshaal - Hamas' politburo chief living in exile - was declared the group's overall leader after Sheikh Yassin was killed in an Israeli missile strike.

Rantissi had in survived an earlier assassination, but die

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Rantisi was visible spokesman for violent group

Abdel Aziz Rantisi, the Hamas leader assassinated in an Israeli air strike Saturday, was one of the highest profile and most extreme voices of the violent Islamic group.

He served as Hamas leader in Gaza for less than a month after Israel killed his predecessor, Hamas founder Sheik Ahmed Yassin, in a similar helicopter missile strike on March

Rantisi rejected any accommodation with Israel, following strict Hamas ideology that called for destruction of the Jewish state in the Middle East.

A pediatrician by profession with a reasonable command of English, Rantisi was readily available to foreign journalists and was one of the most recognizable of Hamas’ leaders.

Even before he was chosen to replace Yassin, Rantisi was in Israeli gunsights. Last year, an Israeli helicopter fired missiles at his vehicle, wounding him.

Undeterred bygd attempts on his life
Rantisi, 56, was undeterred by the Israeli attempts to kill him and seemed to p