Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu refused to confirm or deny involvement in last month’s drone attack on an Iranian military facility that Tehran blamed on Israel.

Few details about the attack are known. Iran claimed that it managed to intercept most of the drones, but one slipped past its air defenses and caused superficial damage to the facility. Western sources said Tehran downplayed the strike and called it a success.  

Iran blamed Israel for the attack last week and said it has the right to “respond resolutely.” 

Amir Saeid Iravani, Iran’s ambassador to the UN, wrote in a letter to the UN secretary-general that there was a “terrorist attack against a workshop complex of the Iranian Defense Ministry in the city of Isfahan using three Micro Aerial Vehicles.” He wrote, “Early investigations suggest that the Israeli regime was responsible for this attempted act of aggression.” 

The Wall Street Journal reported that Israel’s Mossad conducted the attack. The paper, citing people familiar with Israeli operations, wrote, “Israel has waged a long-running conflict of sabotage and unacknowledged military strikes against Iran’s nuclear sites, scientists, military officers, and other military targets, as well as against Iranian forces in Syria and cargo ships carrying Iranian oil.”  

Netanyahu, who has vowed in the past to prevent Iran from ever obtaining a nuclear weapon, told CNN that he never talks about “specific operations.” 

“And every time some explosion takes place in the Middle East, Israel is blamed or given responsibility. Sometimes we are, sometimes we’re not,” he said. 

Iravani used Netanyahu’s CNN interview as proof of Israel’s culpability in the attacks. 

TRENDPOST: Netanyahu’s comments essentially admit that “Sometimes we are” responsible for explosions, which in effect means, they can bomb and kill whomever they wish in any country they consider an enemy. However, if countries bombed them back, it would be characterized as an act of terror carried out by terrorists.

Last week, we reported on the drone strike on the military facility in Isfahan. (See “TOP TREND 2023, MIDDLE EAST MELTDOWN: ISRAEL LAUNCHES DRONE ATTACK ON IRANIAN MILITARY FACILITY” 31 Jan 2023.) 

Ukraine has accused Tehran of providing Russia with drones that have been put to effective use in the war, and cheered Israel’s attack.  

Mykhailo Podolyak, an advisor to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, posted on Twitter shortly after the strike: “Explosive night in Iran. [Ukraine] did try to warn you.” 

Ukraine is growing desperate and needs the war to expand, so any chance Kyiv gets to pull other countries into the fight is seen as worthwhile. Kyiv’s official stance on the attack was ignorance.  

Yevhen Korniichuk, Ukraine’s ambassador to Israel, said in June that Israel declined the sale of the Iron Dome system to Ukraine. 

Netanyahu, meanwhile, alluded to his services to be a mediator between Russia and Ukraine.  

“If asked by all relevant parties, I’ll certainly consider it. But I’m not pushing myself in,” he said. 

Iran and Moscow continue to foster their military relationship and have plans to build a drone factory in Russia with a focus on developing an improved and faster drone based on Iran’s Shahed-136, “that is capable of evading Ukraine’s air defense system,” Haaretz reported.