Mysterious explosions keep happening in Iran. Israel is likely behind it.
Experts say the suspected sabotage is part of Israel’s long-term efforts to delay any and all of Iran’s nuclear development.For weeks, Iran has faced a deadly wave of explosions and fires at sensitive military and civilian sites, including one incident that caused immense damage to an important nuclear facility. No one officially knows why it’s happening or who is responsible — but many believe Israel, with the Trump administration’s tacit or even direct support, is behind it all.On June 26, a massive explosion rocked the Khojir missile-production complex, a location considered vital to Iran’s missile capabilities. Four days later, another blast — this time at a medical clinic north of the capital, Tehran — killed 19 people.On July 2, an explosion and fire occurred at the underground Natanz nuclear facility, a key component to the country’s uranium-enrichment efforts. What actually transpired is unclear, but a Middle Eastern official — believed to be the head of Israeli intelligence, Yossi Cohen — told the New York Times last week that Israel had detonated a bomb. Analysts differ on the extent of the damage, but assessments say centrifuge production may have been delayed a few months or even a few years as a result of the explosion and fire.
And this week, fires broke out in an aluminum plant in Lamerd and a seaport in Bushehr, engulfing at least seven wooden ships in the process.
From earlier:
Another Blast at Power Plant in Iran- Sabotage?
It’s possible all of this is a coincidence. With a reeling economy and a devastating coronavirus outbreak, perhaps the Islamic Republic has merely struggled to maintain sensitive facilities that require constant upkeep. Accidents do happen.But current and former US and Israeli officials as well as experts I spoke to are pretty certain Israel is responsible for the incidents at the military and nuclear sites (but not the clinic or the port or plant), with or without Washington’s explicit approval.“There is a pattern of escalation and a context that would suggest a motive on the Israeli side to target the Iranians,” said Dalia Dassa Kaye, the director of the Center for Middle East Public Policy at the RAND Corporation.
“Israel as well as the US have a clear interest in stopping, or at least disrupting, Iran’s weapons production capability, and in particular nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles,” retired Israel Defense Forces Lt. Col. Raphael Ofek, who served in Israeli military intelligence and in the prime minister’s office, told me.
Nuclear experts at the Institute for Science and International Security on July 8 assessed that the facility had sustained “significant, extensive, and likely irreparable, damage to its main assembly hall section” which “was critical to the mass production of advanced centrifuges.” (Research and development of those centrifuges was permitted under the terms of the Iran nuclear deal, experts told me.)“The building’s replacement would be expected to take at least a year, if not longer,” the nuclear analysts concluded.And per Ofek, the explosion “won’t dramatically disrupt Iran’s advanced centrifuges program,” but “it may delay the deployment of the latest models of these machines for a year or two.”
Such assessments are important, former US Ambassador to Israel Daniel Shapiro told me. Israeli officials believe that if those advanced centrifuges were ever installed and operated at full capacity, it “might allow Iran to break out not with just one bomb, but with an arsenal” of nuclear weapons, he said. Delaying that possibility, then, is certainly a clear and vital Israeli goal.
It’s therefore plausible that Israel was involved in the explosions at the missile and nuclear facilities — though there is no official confirmation that’s the case — and that the US may have given some kind of thumbs-up to such efforts. Tehran, importantly, surely suspects Jerusalem. (?) ( Tel Aviv is no longer the capital?)
“Regardless of whether these are part of a Western sabotage effort ... Iran is going to believe that they are,” Brewer, who now works on nuclear issues at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told me. “Given that these are hitting all across Iran at military and civilian locations, that is going to cause Iran’s threat perceptions to spike.”
But those perceptions depend greatly on the kind of campaign Iran thinks Israel might be waging.
Iran likely won’t respond forcefully — for now
Officials in Iran might therefore see the Khojir and Natanz explosions as part of that fight, thereby compelling them to respond in a bigger way in the tit-for-tat. However, most experts believe Iran will see the incidents in the context of its long-running nuclear feud with Israel.If that’s the case, it would be good news. What Israel may have done “is a slight escalation, but it’s not really that surprising and not really uncharacteristic of what you’ve seen in the recent history,” Ilan Goldenberg, the Defense Department’s Iran team chief from 2009 to 2012, told me. “All these activities are being done in a way that makes it hard for Iran to retaliate, and gives them space to not retaliate.”Indeed, the Iranian regime is faltering under sustained economic pressure from the United States, one of the world’s worst coronavirus outbreaks, and political protests. It may not have the time or desire to engage in a massive fight with Israel right now.Between the deniability of Israel and America’s involvement, and the fact that the possible attacks fit into a longstanding pattern, Tehran may not feel compelled to respond immediately and in a dramatically forceful way.That’s not to say Iran will stand by idly forever. Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Abbas Mousavi vowed this week that “if a regime or a government is involved in the Natanz incident, Iran will react decisively.”
And if Israel and the US continue to hit Iran while it’s down, it may have no choice but to get back up, including potentially launching more cyberattacks or even pushing to develop a nuclear weapon before Israel can do anything about it. Any of those moves would be very provocative — and perhaps make an already dangerous situation much worse.“The Iranians don’t want this to spiral,” the RAND Corporation’s Kaye told me, “but the longer this persists, the harder it will be for Iran to pretend this isn’t happening.”“It’s a humiliation at a certain point,” she said.
A select few reports:
2012: Israel killed Iranian scientists. 2014: Massive Targeted CyberAttack- mostly striking Iran- Flame 2014: An explosion, bombing or fire at Parchin, Iran. Was Israel involved?