The BBC published a report on the Israeli intelligence infiltration of Iran that would help solve some of the mysteries that marred Israeli operations, which for a while remained without a clear explanation.
Israel’s plots inside Iran would not have succeeded without a real penetration into the country’s military leadership, especially since some of the operations were historic and staggering.
Those include, among other, the assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, the senior Iranian nuclear scientist, the tapping of his private conversations for years before his killing, as well as the stealing of nearly half a ton of Iranian top secret nuclear documents and their smuggling abroad.
The BBC report provided us with some information about what is actually happening in Tehran, as it indicated that the Mossad had succeeded in creeping into the IRGC leadership, not just among individuals.
The report quoted sources inside the Evin Prison in Tehran as saying that dozens of senior leaders of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards were being held there. A former Quds Force officer said that foreign agencies have collected evidence against a number of Iranian ambassadors and ICRG commanders.
Furthermore, the report published a statement by Ali Yunesi, a former Iranian intelligence minister and top adviser to President Rouhani, in which he warned: “The Mossad’s influence in many parts of the country is so vast that every member of the Iranian leadership should be worried for their lives, for their safety.”
Accordingly, we are talking here about intelligence efforts, not about different levels of military strength. The report highlights the extent of the Israeli penetration of Iran, where success depends on several factors that help achieve superiority.
We are looking here at an important and dangerous matter: One of the key conditions for victory, is to infiltrate into another country through intelligence services. In fact, such penetration cannot take place unless the targeted internal front is in a state of weakness.
In the Iranian case, we are not talking about penetrations into the ranks of junior officials, or other segments of Iranian society, but rather an intrusion into the ranks of the Revolutionary Guards’ leaders, their intelligence services, and Tehran’s diplomats.
The simplest example here is the case of the Iranian nuclear scientist. The BBC report indicates that after the assassination, Iran’s intelligence minister, Mahmoud Alavi, claimed that two months earlier, he had warned security forces that there was a plot targeting Fakhrizadeh at the exact location where he was shot.
According to the BBC, Alavi said the person who planned the killing was “a member of the armed forces,” adding: “We couldn’t carry out intelligence operations on the armed forces.
This report confirms the military fragility of the Iranian internal arena. It also means that the Iranian leadership cannot be reassured as long as its top military officials are infiltrated to this extent. We can now also understand the magnitude of the Israeli strikes against Iran and its militias in Syria.
It is clear that Tehran is not only at enmity with its neighbors and the international community, but also with the Iranian interior itself.
