Malaysian police have found the motorbike allegedly used in the drive-by shooting of a Palestinian scientist in Kuala Lumpur, the national police chief said Tuesday.
Fadi Mohammad al-Batsh, 35, was killed in a hail of bullets by two attackers Saturday as he walked to a mosque for dawn prayers.
The family of Batsh, a member of Islamist militant group Hamas who was said to be a rocket-making expert, has accused Israel’s Mossad spy agency of carrying out the killing. Israel has denied the claims.
Kuala Lumpur police have launched a manhunt for the pair and have released photofits of the two suspects, who are light-skinned, bearded men.
National police chief Mohamad Fuzi Harun said that the motorbike allegedly used by the assailants had been found in the Setapak area of Kuala Lumpur.
“The motorcycle is in good condition,” he told reporters, without giving further details
Police previously said they believed either a BMW or a Kawasaki was used in the attack.
Mossad is believed to have assassinated Palestinian militants and scientists in the past, but rarely confirms such operations.
Batsh’s expertise in making weapons could have made him a target — militants in Hamas-ruled Gaza regularly fire rockets at southern Israel, usually without causing casualties.
But Israeli Defence Minister Avigdor Lieberman Sunday denied claims of the Jewish state’s involvement, suggesting instead that it was a “settling of accounts” between factions of a terror group.
It was the second high-profile killing of a foreigner in Malaysia in just over a year.
In February 2017 assassins smeared the banned VX nerve agent on the face of Kim Jong Nam, the estranged half-brother of North Korea’s leader, at Kuala Lumpur International Airport, killing him within minutes.
AFP