A Palestinian man was fatally shot by two assailants on a motorbike as he was heading to a mosque for dawn prayers, Malaysian police said Saturday.
The man was identified as a relative of a senior official in the Gaza branch of the Islamic Jihad group by Palestinian news outlets.
Palestinian Ambassador Anwar H. Al Agha was quoted by the New Straits Times newspaper as saying the victim was Fadi M. R. Albatsh, a second imam at the mosque. He had been reportedly living in Malaysia for 10 years.
Albatsh's family, as well as a senior Islamic Jihad leader, Khaled al-Batash, have accused Israel's Mossad intelligence service of being behind the murder. The family said that Albatsh was supposed to have left for Turkey on Saturday to attend a conference on energy.
In an interview on the television network Al-Miyadin, Khaled al-Batash demanded that Malaysia "conduct a comprehensive and rapid investigation to prevent the escape of the assassins."
Malaysian police say they are investigating all angles, including terrorism.
"The suspect fired 10 shots, four of which hit the lecturer in the head and body. He died on the spot," the official Bernama news agency quoted Kuala Lumpur police chief Mazlan Lazim as saying.
Mazlan said a recording of a closed-circuit television camera near the scene showed the two assailants waited for about 20 minutes for the Palestinian lecturer.
"We believe the lecturer was their target because two other individuals walked by the place earlier unharmed," he said.
Palestinian sources said Albatsh was a university lecturer at a private university. He also worked with the MyCare charity association in Malaysia, which includes several charitable and humanitarian organizations such as the Al-Aqsa Foundation and i4Syria.
Albatsh was vocal about the Palestinian cause on social media. He had shared many tweets supporting the Great March for Return and also posted about slain Palestinian journalist Yaser Murtaja.
