Iran: We thwarted Mossad attempt to assassinate nuclear scientist

By Ariel Solomon
The Jerusalem Post

Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards Corps thwarted a Mossad assassination attempt against one of its nuclear scientists, a senior Iranian security official said on Saturday.

“In the last two years, the Zionist enemy was trying hard to assassinate an Iranian nuclear scientist, but the timely presence of the IRGC security forces thwarted the terrorist operation,” Col. Ya’qoub Baqeri, the deputy chief liaison officer of the Flight Guards Corps, told the country’s Fars News Agency.

The Revolutionary Guards is “duty-bound to protect the lives of the country’s nuclear scientists,” said Baqeri.

According to a report by CBS News last year, the Obama administration pressured Israel to stop carrying out assassinations inside Iran against the country’s nuclear scientists.

Israel has never admitted to carrying out such killings. At least five scientists have been killed, mostly by car bombs. Mossad officials concluded that the assassination campaign became too dangerous for its spies, said the report. This came amidst Washington’s attempt to reach a nuclear deal with Iran.

Meanwhile, Baqeri also told Fars that Iranian air marshals from the IRGC have foiled Islamic State plots to hijack Iranian passenger planes in recent years.

“The ISIL [Islamic State] and other Salafi groups sought to hit a blow to our country this way, but fortunately, they couldn’t put their plots into practice,” Baqeri said.