A suspect was arrested in connection to the 2018 assassination of Hamas engineer Fadi Mohammad al-Batsh in Malaysia, the group’s Interior Ministry announced Sunday.
While Hamas initially charged Israel’s Mossad for being behind the murder, the identity of the arrested remains unknown.
Al-Batsh was reportedly involved in talks with North Korea on arms intended for Gaza, according to a New York Times report published in the aftermath of his murder.
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The report alleges that Al-Batsh was killed in a Mossad operation to take out Hamas scientists and engineers training abroad to gather “know-how and weaponry to fight Israel.
“That claim has been confirmed by Middle Eastern intelligence officials,” the New York Times reported, claiming the broader operation was ordered by the Mossad chief, Yossi Cohen.
The joint report by Israeli journalist Ronen Bergman and Hannah Beech, the paper’s Southeast Asia reporter, added that al-Batsh’s negotiations with North Korea were carried out through Malaysia, citing Western and Middle Eastern intelligence sources.
According to the Malaysian Royal Police, two men on a high-powered motorcycle fired at least 14 shots at al-Batsh outside a mosque he was attending, killing him on the spot.
A Kawasaki motorcycle was found abandoned near a lake about nine minutes from the scene, from which police were able to trace a photo of one of the suspects, Inspector-General of Police Mohamad Fuzi Harun told reporters.
Authorities had originally released computer-generated photographs of the suspects, who witnesses described as well-built and light-skinned, possibly Middle Eastern or European.
The suspects were believed to have entered Malaysia sometime in late January, but it was not known what nationalities they were or where they had traveled from, said Fuzi.
Al-Batsh was a lecturer at Universiti Kuala Lumpur, specializing in power engineering, according to the university. According to the Hamas affiliated news agency SPA, Batsh also involved with Islamic organizations, including MyCARE.
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