Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Monday that Israel’s retaliatory strike against Iran last month hit an active component of Tehran’s nuclear program, despite the US urging to avoid such sites.
While initial reports indicated that Israel hit a military base in Parchin formerly linked to Iran’s nuclear weapons program, Israeli officials now claim the site was actively working on nuclear weapons research, Axios reports.
Netanyahu, who has kept mum about the details and scope of the attack, confirmed the reports during a speech to parliament despite previous assurances to the US and Gulf states that Tehran’s nuclear and oil facilities would be off the table.
“It’s not a secret,” Netanyahu said of the reports. “There is a specific component in their nuclear programme that was hit in this attack.”
While Netanyahu did not name the component that was hit, the Associated Press previously revealed that the Oct. 26 strike hit the Parchin base, located southeast of Tehran.
Satellite images showed that an entire building in the base was demolished, with the Albright’s Institute for Science and International Security identifying the building as the “Taleghan 2” facility, where Iran once allegedly conducted explosives tests on uranium cores.
It remains unclear if any equipment tied to the nuclear program remained at Parchin after the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA) move to access the site in 2011, but Israeli officials told Axios Iran was still using the building for its weapons’ program.
One former Israeli official claimed the building housed sophisticated equipment used to design the plastic explosives that surround uranium in nuclear devices.
“They conducted scientific activity that could lay the ground for the production of a nuclear weapon,” a US official told Axios, claiming it was so top secret that not everyone in Tehran knew of its existence.
Netanyahu claimed the strike against the site was necessary to block Iran’s path to creating a nuclear weapon.
Along with discussing the Oct. 26 strike, Netanyahu also offered some details about Israel’s previous retaliatory strike in April.
He said the April counterattack was aimed at taking out one of four Russian supplied S-300 surface-to-air missile defense batteries surrounding the Iranian capital.
Netanyahu confirmed that October’s strike destroyed the remaining three batteries, a clear threat aimed at deterring Iran from attacking Israel again.
Tehran, however, has vowed to directly attack Israel following last month’s retaliatory strike, with Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei warning Israel and the US of a “tooth-breaking response.”
With Post wires
