Aruri's comrades will become a "nightmare" for Israel, IRGC Quds Force chief warned.

Brigadier General Esmail Qaani warned in a letter sent to Hamas political director Ismail Haniyeh on Sunday. Kaani congratulated Haniyeh for the martyrdom of Aruri in the Israeli terrorist drone attack in Lebanon.

"The world will witness how the companions of Martyr Aruri became the terror of a regime of infanticide," he wrote. "Aruri had a remarkable record and suffered the first al-Aqsa and al-Quds intifadas," the IRGC commander added, referring to three Palestinian uprisings against the Israeli regime in recent years.

Arouri, 57, died on January 2 in Dahiyeh, south of Beirut. He was a founding member of Hamas' military wing known as the Qassam Brigades and held political portfolios in recent years.

He was considered a key figure in the movement and, after serving a long term in Israeli prisons, went into exile in Syria, Turkey, Qatar and finally Lebanon, where he organized operations in the West Bank. Haniyeh said the cowardly killing of Aruri is proof that Israel is trying to hide its failures and avoid defeat in its war of attrition against the besieged Gaza Strip.