Israel destroyed fleet of UAV aircraft inside Iran – report

Although Israel regularly bombs Iranian assets in Syria, an attack on an Iranian base inside of Iran would be an extremely rare, even unprecedented, move.

By Lauren Marcus, World Israel News

Iran’s fleet of UAVs was largely destroyed during an alleged Israeli airstrike on a military base near Kermanshah in western Iran in February 2022, and the incident was reportedly one of the triggers for Iran to fire at least 12 ballistic missiles at the U.S. Consulate in Erbil, Iraq.

According to a report from Hebrew-language daily Haaretz, Israel took the unusual step of conducting an airstrike inside of Iran.

Hundreds of drones were either completely destroyed or severely damaged, though the Iranian government at the time blamed the loss of the UAVs on a fire at the base.

Although Israel regularly bombs Iranian assets in Syria, an attack on an Iranian base inside of Iran would be an extremely rare, even unprecedented, move.

Early on Sunday morning, Iran launched missile strikes on the unoccupied American consulate building in the Kurdistan region of northern Iraq. An Iranian government statement said that the strike was aimed at “secret Israeli bases” in the region.

Although the building and others nearby were damaged, no casualties were reported.

Hezbollah-linked Lebanese TV station Al Mayadeen, however, reported that “four Israeli officers were killed, in addition to seven wounded, four of whom are in a critical condition.”

The station did not present any evidence to support that claim.

Al Mayadeen said that the Israeli army had used the U.S. Consulate as an operative base, and that the attack on Iranian drones in February had originated from that location.

“The same headquarters [targeted by Iran] was responsible for an intelligence and aggressive operation against Iran in recent times,” the report read.

The Kurdish government has vehemently denied that the Consulate compound was being utilized by Israel for military or intelligence-gathering purposes.

Earlier in March, a Channel 12 report revealed that Israel has thwarted attempts to launch armed aircraft and drones from Iran.

An IDF spokesman said that in recent months, Israeli F-35s shot down two enemy aircraft in an air-to-air missile strike, adding that as far as he knew, this was the first time in world military history that such a maneuver had been used successfully.