Israeli warplanes struck locations in Doha on Sept. 9, 2025, targeting what Israel said were residential headquarters used by senior members of Hamas’ political bureau, including part of a negotiating delegation involved in recent ceasefire talks, officials and early reports said. The strikes followed days after a photograph circulated online showing a meeting room at the Ritz-Carlton in Doha that United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) and other groups said depicted senior Hamas figures and Iran’s foreign minister.
The image, shared widely on social media and obtained by advocacy groups, shows an orange-and-green wallpapered meeting room with a centered abstract painting, water bottles, pens and arranged flowers. UANI said the photograph showed senior Hamas figure Khalil al-Hayya with Iran’s foreign minister, Seyyed Abbas Araghchi, and a Tehran-based delegation inside the Doha Ritz-Carlton. There is no publicly available evidence that the Israeli strikes specifically targeted the hotel, and Israeli accounts described hits on a residential compound where several members of Hamas’ political leadership were located.
Early reports said at least two people were killed in the strikes, including the son of a Hamas negotiator; those casualty claims were first reported by regional outlets and have not been independently verified by international agencies. Israeli officials said the targets were linked to Hamas’ political and negotiating apparatus. Qatar, which hosts a number of Gaza-related mediations and has maintained communication channels with Hamas, did not immediately publish a full account of the damage or confirm the identities of the dead.
The photograph and its purported location prompted a written complaint from UANI’s chief executive, Mark Wallace, who sent a letter to Marriott International — the U.S.-based parent company that manages the Ritz-Carlton brand — seeking a public explanation for how the hotel was used for such meetings. In the letter, Wallace called hosting Hamas leaders an "exceptional reputational and legal" risk and asked Marriott to respond within 48 hours, according to the organization and media that published its letter. Wallace told the Daily Mail that American companies should not provide facilities to what he described as state sponsors of terrorism.
Marriott, the Ritz-Carlton Doha and Qatari authorities did not immediately issue detailed public statements addressing the contents of the photo or the letter, and the hotel was reported to have been contacted for comment by regional and international media.
Iran has long provided political, financial and military support to a range of militant groups across the Middle East, including Hamas, Hezbollah and the Houthi movement. The United States has designated Iran a state sponsor of terrorism since 1984, and the U.S. lists Hamas as a Foreign Terrorist Organization. UANI and similar advocacy groups say evidence of direct Iranian involvement in high-level Hamas decision-making underscores concerns about Tehran’s influence in the region.
Qatar has frequently served as a host and interlocutor in negotiations concerning Gaza and has maintained relations with Hamas leaders, a role that Doha says enables mediation and humanitarian coordination. Western governments have at times relied on Qatari channels to facilitate talks, while also criticizing Doha for providing a meeting space to figures some countries deem extremist.
Israeli strikes on foreign soil signal a widening geographic scope of the campaign that began with the October 2023 Hamas attack and subsequent Israeli military operations in Gaza. Such cross-border strikes raise diplomatic tensions and questions about the locations and protections of political delegations operating abroad. International and regional responses to the Doha strikes were still developing late Tuesday, with governments and monitoring groups seeking more detailed casualty and target verification.
The photograph of the Ritz-Carlton meeting room and the Israeli strikes in Doha underscore the opaque and transnational nature of the negotiations and alliances tied to the Gaza conflict. As investigators and governments seek to corroborate the image and the provenance of the meeting shown in it, advocacy groups and hotel operators face pressure to explain how and why certain delegations are accommodated on internationally managed premises. Media outlets that first published the photograph reported reaching out to the Ritz-Carlton for comment; no comprehensive public response had been posted by the company by late Tuesday.