Hamas leader Mahmoud Al-Mabhouh was assassinated by a team of 11 mercenaries in his hotel room in Dubai last month, the emirate's police chief said Monday.
"This is a highly sophisticated operation conducted by people who knew when Al-Mabhouh would arrive in the country," Lt. Gen. Dhahi Tamim told reporters in Dubai.
"We have identified the suspects and will issue arrest warrants against them and will take legal action against anyone or any party which will prove to stand behind the murder," Tamim added, as police released photos and CCTV videos of the accused European nationals.
Tamim said two suspects are Palestinians, both residents of the UAE. They have been detained on suspicion they provided logistical support to the operation, he said. According to the Dubai-based satellite network Al-Arabiya, the two were handed over by Jordan. One of them is reportedly a security officer in the Palestinian Authority, the US-backed Palestinian government based in Ramallah. Neither suspect was named.
The alleged assassins, 10 men and one woman, used "advanced technologies" not available in the UAE to execute their mission, moving from hotel to hotel dressed as tennis players, Tamim said. All carried European Union passports – six British, three Irish and one each from France and Germany, he said.
The National, an English-language newspaper in the UAE, said police identified the main suspect at French citizen Peter Elvinger, 49. He was the logistical coordinator and the one who booked a room down the hall from Al-Mabhouh's hotel room, the report said.
The other suspects were identified by the newspaper as Irish nationals Gail Folliard, Kevin Daveron and Evan Dennings; UK nationals Paul John Keely, Stephan Daniel Hodes, Melvyn Adam Mildiner, Jonathan Louis Graham, James Leonard Clarke and Michael Lawrence Barney. German national Michael Bodenheimer is also a suspect, according to the report.
Hamas and others have blamed Israel for the assassination, but the Dubai police chief stopped short of directly accusing any specific party of organizing the hit. "Currently we do not have clear evidence that a specific apparatus has carried out the act," Tamim said, adding that his investigation had not ruled out the Mossad.
Israel has accused Al-Mabhouh of organizing the capture of soldiers several decades ago, as well as serving as a liaison between Hamas and Iran, and has yet to deny Hamas' allegations that its agents carried out the assassination.
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