Israeli hack of Iranian bodyguards’ phones exposed secret leadership meeting – NYT

While the officials themselves left their phones behind, their guards and drivers carried devices that were compromised and used to pinpoint the location.

By Vered Weiss, World Israel News

Israeli intelligence hacked the mobile phones of Iranian bodyguards, enabling an airstrike last June that targeted a secret meeting of Iran’s top leaders in a Tehran bunker, The New York Times reported.

The June 16 meeting of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council was being held in an underground chamber west of the capital, 100 feet beneath a mountain slope.

Present were President Masoud Pezeshkian, the heads of the judiciary and intelligence ministry, and senior Revolutionary Guards commanders.

While the officials themselves left their phones behind, their guards and drivers carried devices that were compromised and used to pinpoint the location.

Israeli jets struck the site shortly after the meeting began, dropping six bombs that destroyed entrances and killed several guards.

Those inside the bunker survived, though Pezeshkian sustained a leg injury and the interior minister required hospital treatment for breathing difficulties after escaping through debris.

Iran later admitted the lapse and moved to ban phones among security details protecting senior officials, military commanders, and nuclear scientists. The revelation underscored how Israel has repeatedly exploited electronic surveillance to penetrate Iran’s most secure circles.

The strike came amid a wider Israeli campaign that killed dozens of Iranian commanders and more than a dozen nuclear scientists in the opening week of fighting.

Tehran has since executed one scientist accused of spying for Israel and detained numerous officials and Revolutionary Guards officers on suspicion of collaboration.

Former Vice President Mostafa Hashemi Taba said infiltration had reached “the highest echelons of our decision making.” Analysts in Tehran described the failure to control bodyguards’ phones as a major security breach.

Reflecting on the attack, Pezeshkian later told clerics that had the strike succeeded in killing the entire leadership, the country could have descended into chaos. “Life hinges on one second,” he said. “If Israel had killed us all, people would have lost hope.”