Iran blames Israel for sabotage at Natanz nuclear site
Iran on Monday blamed Israel for a sabotage attack on its underground Natanz nuclear facility that damaged the centrifuges it uses to enrich uranium there, warning that it would avenge the assault.
The comments by Foreign Ministry spokesman Saeed Khatibzadeh
represent the first official accusation leveled against Israel for the assault
Sunday that cut power across the facility.
Israel has not directly claimed responsibility for the
attack. However, suspicion fell immediately on it as Israeli media widely
reported that a devastating cyberattack orchestrated by Israel caused the
blackout.
If Israel was responsible, it would further heighten
tensions between the two nations, already engaged in a shadow conflict across
the wider Middle East. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who met
Sunday with U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, has vowed to do everything in
his power to stop efforts to revive a nuclear deal between Iran and world
powers.
At a news conference at Israel’s Nevatim air base Monday,
where he viewed Israeli air and missile defense systems and its F-35 combat
aircraft, U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin declined to say whether the
Natanz incident is likely to impede the Biden administration’s efforts to
re-engage with Iran on its nuclear program.
“Those efforts will continue.” Austin said.
Details remained scarce about what happened early Sunday at
the facility. The event was initially described as a blackout caused by the
electrical grid feeding its above-ground workshops and underground enrichment
halls.
“The answer for Natanz is to take revenge against Israel,”
Khatibzadeh said. “Israel will receive its answer through its own path.” He did
not elaborate.
Khatibzadeh acknowledged that IR-1 centrifuges, the
first-generation workhorse of Iran’s uranium enrichment, had been damaged in
the attack, but did not elaborate. State television has yet to show images from
the facility.
A former chief of Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard said
the attack had also set off a fire at the site and called for improvements in
security. In a tweet, Gen. Mohsen Rezaei said that a second fire at Natanz in a
year signaled “the seriousness of the infiltration phenomenon.”
Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif separately
warned Natanz would be reconstructed with more advanced machines, something
that could imperil ongoing talks in Vienna with world powers about saving
Tehran’s tattered atomic accord.
“The Zionists wanted to take revenge against the Iranian
people for their success on the path of lifting sanctions,” Iran’s state-run
IRNA news agency quoted Zairf as saying. “But we do not allow (it) and we will
take revenge for this action against the Zionists.”
The IAEA, the United Nations body that monitors Tehran’s
atomic program, earlier said it was aware of media reports about the blackout
at Natanz and had spoken with Iranian officials about it. The agency did not
elaborate.
Natanz has been targeted by sabotage in the past. The
Stuxnet computer virus, discovered in 2010 and widely believed to be a joint
U.S.-Israeli creation, once disrupted and destroyed Iranian centrifuges at
Natanz during an earlier period of Western fears about Tehran’s program.
In July, Natanz suffered a mysterious explosion at its
advanced centrifuge assembly plant that authorities later described as
sabotage. Iran now is rebuilding that facility deep inside a nearby mountain.
Iran also blamed Israel for the November killing of a scientist who began the
country’s military nuclear program decades earlier.
Multiple Israeli media outlets reported Sunday that an
Israeli cyberattack caused the blackout in Natanz. Public broadcaster Kan said
the Mossad was behind the attack. Channel 12 TV cited “experts” as estimating
the attack shut down entire sections of the facility.
While the reports offered no sourcing for their information,
Israeli media maintains a close relationship with the country’s military and
intelligence agencies.
“It’s hard for me to believe it’s a coincidence,” Yoel
Guzansky, a senior fellow at Tel Aviv’s Institute for National Security
Studies, said of the blackout. “If it’s not a coincidence, and that’s a big if,
someone is trying to send a message that ‘we can limit Iran’s advance and we
have red lines.’”
It also sends a message that Iran’s most sensitive nuclear
site is penetrable, he added.
Netanyahu late Sunday toasted his security chiefs, with the
head of the Mossad, Yossi Cohen, at his side on the eve of his country’s
Independence Day.
“It is very difficult to explain what we have accomplished,”
Netanyahu said of Israel’s history, saying the country had been transformed
from a position of weakness into a “world power.”
Israel typically doesn’t discuss operations carried out by
its Mossad intelligence agency or specialized military units. In recent weeks,
Netanyahu repeatedly has described Iran as the major threat to his country as
he struggles to hold onto power after multiple elections and while facing
corruption charges.
Comments
Post a Comment