Israel used Iranian scientists to blow up nuclear installations

Up to 10 Iranian scientists working at the Natanz facility were recruited by Mossad and used to place the explosives. 

By Donna Rachel Edmunds, World Israel News. 

A small group of Iranian nuclear scientists helped Mossad, Israel’s national intelligence agency, to carry out targeted strikes against the Islamic regime’s nuclear installations, setting back efforts to create a nuclear bomb.

Up to 10 scientists were approached by Mossad agents and asked to assist in the second of three major strikes carried out against Iranian facilities earlier this year, The Jewish Chronicle discovered.

Believing they were assisting international dissident groups, the scientists agreed, helping to blow up the A1000 centrifuge hall at Natanz in April.

“The scientists’ motivations were all different,” a source told The JC. “Mossad found out what they deeply wanted in their lives and offered it to them. There was an inner circle of scientists who knew more about the operation, and an outer circle who helped out but had less information.”

The centrifuge hall, which housed up to 5,000 centrifuges, is protected by 40 feet of concrete and iron, ruling out an air assault. Consequently the team of insiders were essential to smuggling explosives into the hall in various ways.

Some of the explosives were hidden in boxes of food, brought in by a catering lorry, while others were dropped in by drone and discretely whisked away by the scientists.

Once in place, the bombs were available to be set off remotely, which was done just hours after Iran publicly declared it had begun to use IR-5 and IR-6 centrifuges at the site in contravention of the 2015 nuclear deal.

The resulting explosion destroyed vital internal power systems, causing a blackout at the facility. Ninety percent of the centrifuges were taken out of action, setting Iran’s operations at Natanz back up to nine months.

The scientists involved were quietly evacuated to safe locations. “All of them are very safe today,” the source told The JC.

Fereydoon Abbasi Davani, head of the Iranian parliament’s energy committee, later admitted on state television that the attack had been “rather beautiful.”

The April operation was the second attack in a chain of three, designed to cripple Iran’s nuclear industry as the regime strives to manufacture weapons grade uranium.

The first attack had come nearly a year earlier, in July 2020, with an explosion inside the Iran Centre for Advanced Centrifuges (ICAC) warehouse at Natanz.

That bomb was placed inadvertently a year earlier by the Iranians themselves, after Mossad agents posing as construction wholesalers sold building materials for use in the centrifuge hall to Iranian officials.

“The Iranians have always known that Israel has infiltrated their supply chains, but they are powerless to do anything about it,” a source told The JC.

The third attack took place in June this year, with Mossad turning its attention to the TESA complex in Karaj, the key site of production for the centrifuges Iran required to get the Natanz facility back online.

That attack was carried out using an armed quadcopter drone weighing approximately the same as a motorcycle. Parts for the drone had to be smuggled into the county piece by piece by agents, before being assembled in situ. After its use to strike the TESA site, the drone was smuggled away to be used in further operations.

Richard Pater, Executive Director of Britain Israel Communications and Research Centre (Bicom), told The JC: “There is a sense that the Americans are so desperate to return to the deal that they would be too soft. However, it is quite clear that Britain and the rest of the international community still sees negotiation as the most effective track to rein in Iranian ambitions.

“Israel is not convinced that this will be enough, and also doubts that more problematic partners, like Russia and China, will be able to hold same line.

“Therefore, the credibility of the threat from Israel needs to be enhanced, reiterated and re-imposed, as part of a dual effort to put real pressure on Iranians.”

He added: “In terms of geopolitics, that is the message that these operations are sending to the international community.”

iran nuclear programIran nuclear threatMossadNatanz