Satellite images show Iran’s secret military bases damaged in Israeli attack

Israel’s attack on Iran damaged the facilities of a secret military base southeast of the Iranian capital, which experts in the past have linked to Tehran’s nuclear weapons program at one time, and another base linked to its ballistic missile program, according to satellite photos analyzed on Sunday, October 27, 2024. gave. ) with Associated Press to show.

Some of the damaged buildings were located at Iran’s Parchin military base, where the International Atomic Energy Agency suspects Iran has conducted high explosive tests in the past that could trigger a nuclear weapon. Although Iran has long insisted that its nuclear program is peaceful, the IAEA, Western intelligence agencies and others say Tehran had an active weapons program as far back as 2003.

Other damage can be seen at the nearby Khojir military base, which analysts believe hides an underground tunnel system and missile production sites.

The Iranian military did not acknowledge damage to Hojir or Parchin in the Israeli attack in the early hours of Saturday, October 26, 2024, but said four Iranian soldiers working in the country’s air defense systems were killed in the attack. Iran announced that a civilian was also killed on Sunday, October 27, 2024, but did not provide details.

Iran’s mission to the United Nations did not respond to a request for comment. The Israeli army declined to comment.

‘It should not be exaggerated or underestimated’

However, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told the audience on Sunday, October 27, 2024 that the Israeli attack “It should neither be exaggerated nor underestimated.” while stopping short of calling for an immediate retaliatory strike. In a separate statement on Sunday, October 27, 2024, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that Israel’s attacks “caused serious damage” to Iran and that the dam “achieved all its objectives.”

It is not yet known how many sites in total were targeted in the Israeli attack. So far, no damage images have been released by the Iranian army.

Iranian officials determined that the affected areas were in Ilam, Khuzestan and Tehran provinces. Burnt areas were visible in satellite images from Planet Labs PBC around the Tange Bijar natural gas production facility in Iran’s Ilam province on Saturday, October 26, 2024, but it was not immediately clear whether this was related to the attack. Ilam province is located on the Iran-Iraq border in Western Iran.

The most visible damage can be seen in Planet Labs images of Parchin near the Mamalu Dam, about 40 kilometers southeast of downtown Tehran. One structure appeared to be completely destroyed and others were damaged in the attack.

Satellite images show damage to at least two structures in Hojir, about 20 kilometers from Tehran city centre.

Analysts, including Decker Eveleth of the Virginia-based think tank CNA, Joe Truzman of the Washington-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies, and former United Nations weapons inspector David Albright, as well as other open source experts, first identified the damage at the bases. . The locations of the two bases correspond to the resulting videos. access point It shows that Iranian air defense systems opened fire in the vicinity in the early hours of Saturday (October 26, 2024).

Albright’s Institute for Science and International Security identified the collapsed building on the mountainside in Parchin as “Taleghan 2.” An archive of Iranian nuclear data previously seized by Israel stated that the building housed “a smaller, taller high-explosive chamber and a flash X-ray system for examining small-scale high explosive tests.”

“Such tests may have involved high explosives compressing the natural uranium nucleus, simulating the detonation of a nuclear explosive,” says a 2018 report by the institute.

In a message published on the social platform “This explains the IAEA’s hasty and secretive renewal efforts following its request for access to Parchin in 2011.”

It is unclear what equipment will be located inside the “Taleghan 2” building in the early hours of Saturday, October 26, 2024. There were no Israeli attacks on Iran’s oil industry, nuclear enrichment sites, or the nuclear power plant in Bushehr. attack.

Iran says it is not affected

IAEA chief Rafael Mariano Grossi confirmed in X that “Iran’s nuclear facilities were not affected.”

“Investigators are safe and continue their vital work,” he added. “I call for caution and to stay away from actions that could endanger the safety and security of nuclear and other radioactive materials.”

Other buildings destroyed in Khojir and Parchin likely included buildings where Iran used industrial mixers to produce the solid fuel needed for its extensive ballistic missile arsenal, Mr. Eveleth said.

The Israeli army said in a statement immediately after the attack on Saturday, October 26, 2024, that it targeted “missile production facilities used to produce the missiles that Iran fired at the state of Israel last year.”

Destroying such facilities could greatly disrupt Iran’s ability to produce new ballistic missiles to replenish its arsenal following two attacks on Israel. Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, which oversees the country’s ballistic missile program, has remained silent since the attack on Saturday, October 26, 2024.

Iran’s overall ballistic missile arsenal, which includes short-range missiles that cannot reach Israel, was estimated at “over 3,000” by Gen. Kenneth McKenzie, then commander of the US military’s Central Command, in testimony to the US Senate in 2022. Since then, Iran has fired hundreds of missiles in a series of attacks.

No videos or photos of missile fragments or damage to civilian neighborhoods were posted on social media following the latest attack; This suggests that Israeli strikes were much more accurate than Iran’s ballistic missile strikes targeting Israel in April and October. Israel relied on missiles fired from aircraft during its attack.

But a factory appears to have been hit in Shamsabad Industrial City, just south of Tehran, near Imam Khomeini International Airport, the country’s main gateway to the outside world. Online videos of the damaged building corresponded to the address of a firm known as TIECO, which bills itself as a manufacturer of advanced machinery used in Iran’s oil and gas industry.