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Iran blames Israel, US for killing nuclear scientist
(Bloomberg) – Iran accused Israel and the United States of being behind the assassination of one of its top nuclear scientists on Friday and vowed revenge, sharply escalating tensions in the Persian Gulf over the years. last weeks of Donald Trump’s presidency, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh was its leader. of research and innovation at the Iranian Ministry of Defense and widely considered to have a major role in the country’s nuclear program. He was killed near the Damavand campus of Islamic Azad University, about 60 kilometers (37 miles) east of central Tehran, the semi-official Tasnim newspaper reported. “Terrorists murdered a prominent Iranian scientist today. This cowardice – with serious indications of the Israeli role – shows desperate warmongering on the part of the perpetrators, ”Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said in a tweet, without offering any evidence of Israel’s involvement. Iranian Labor News Agency. Defense Minister Amir Hatami told state television that the murder was “clearly linked” to the US assassination of General Qassem Soleimani by drone in January. The office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declined to comment, as did Pentagon officials. The Central Intelligence Agency did not immediately respond to questions about whether the United States was aware of any assassination plans. Trump re-tweeted a New York Times report on Fakhrizadeh’s murder without comment, as well. than a tweet from an Israeli journalist who called the murder “a major psychological and professional blow to Iran”. Photos released by the semi-official Fars news agency, allegedly of the scene, showed blood splattered in the street next to a black Iranian-made passenger car with the window open. driver’s side. The car’s windshield had been smashed by several bullet holes. Fakhrizadeh’s death following the murder of four other Iranian nuclear scientists since 2010, with Tehran generally blaming the intelligence agencies of its enemies, Israel and the United States, While Israeli officials have not commented, the country has long viewed Iran’s nuclear research efforts as one of its greatest threats to national security. Israel has vowed to take whatever steps are necessary to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear warheads, weapons that Tehran says it never sought to develop. Stuxnet Attack The United States and Israel are also widely believed to have worked together on a cyberattack that hit centrifuges linked to Tehran’s nuclear program a decade ago, Netanyahu singled out Fakhrizadeh in a presentation of April 2018 he gave on Iran’s nuclear program, claiming the scientist was the director of a secret nuclear weapons development project. The Energy Agency said the “Amad Project” was silenced in 2003, and Iran dismissed Netanyahu’s presentations at the time as “lies and hawkishness.” Fakhrizadeh’s assassination comes at a sensitive time in Iran such as Trump’s defeat on November 3. US elections present an opportunity to reconnect with the West after years of economic and military confrontation Call for Revenge His death could spark the kind of opular anger that followed Soleimani’s targeted murder in a drone strike American in Baghdad ordered by Trump. Iran fired missiles at bases housing US troops in Iraq in response to the attack, causing no deaths but raising fears of a slide into war between the two adversaries. Iranian forces also inadvertently shot down the one of their own passenger planes in response to the Soleimani strike. .Zarif urged the international community to condemn the latest attack, while the head of the Iranian armed forces, Major General Mohammad Bagheri, called for revenge for the assassination. Axios reported this week that the Israeli government had ordered to the army to prepare for a possible US. Strike against Iran for the remainder of Trump’s tenure, although he said the order was not based on intelligence or an assessment that the United States would order an attack. Fakhrizadeh was also named in a UN Security Council resolution of March 2007 as having been involved in Iran. “Nuclear or ballistic missile activities”. Friday’s assassination approaches the 10th anniversary of the assassination of another scientist, Majid Sh ahriari, who was killed in a car bomb on November 29, 2010 Car bombing A number of Fakhrizadeh security guards were injured in Friday’s attack, in which his car was shot down before an explosive-laden Nissan exploded about 15 to 20 meters away Hatami said on state television. Hatami said Fakhrizadeh was involved in an air defense project to detect spy planes without using radar systems and that Israel was well aware of his role in matters that could confuse Israel. Iran’s expanding missile program is a major concern for the United States and Israel, but it is the nuclear issue that has received the most attention: Iran has overstepped the limits of the amount of low-enriched uranium that it was authorized to store under the 2015 nuclear deal with the world. Tehran’s stockpile of low-enriched uranium has risen to around 2,443 kilograms (5,386 pounds), from 2,105 kilograms, according to the latest report from UN observers. That’s enough to create three bombs if Iran chooses to enrich the material to weapon grade. President-elect Joe Biden has said the United States could return to the nuclear deal if Iran returns to the conformity. 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