Illustrative image. (The Israeli Defense Forces)
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian was injured in the leg during an Israeli strike last month that targeted a meeting of the Islamic Republic’s Supreme National Security Council, the Fars news agency reported on July 13.
According to the report, the strike targeted the lower floors of a building in the west part of the capital, Tehran on June 16, just three days into the Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear program. Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Judiciary chief Gholam-Hossein Mohseni-Eje’i, and other senior Iranian officials were at the meeting with Pezeshkian.
Six bombs or missiles hit the access and entry points of the building, apparently in an attempt to prevent those inside from leaving, and to prevent air from getting inside, Fars said, adding that the officials managed to escape via an emergency hatch despite a power outage caused by the strike.
Pezeshkian and some other officials suffered injuries to their legs as they were escaping. Fars noted that the apparently accurate information Israel had in planning and carrying out the strikes has led Iranian authorities to probe whether the Israelis had inside information.
The London-based satellite news channel Iran International on June 16 had reported an Israeli attack on an area near Shahrak-e Gharb in western Tehran.
The Israeli war on Iran came to an end on June 24, just two days after the United States joined the war by targeting three key nuclear sites in the Islamic Republic.
Last week, Pezeshkian accused Israel of trying to kill him, telling American conservative commentator Tucker Carlson in an interview that he was in a meeting and “thanks to the intelligence by the spies that they had, they tried to bombard the area in which we were holding that meeting.”
Israel killed more than 30 senior Iranian military commanders during the war, including Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps chief Gen. Hossein Salami; the head of the Guard’s ballistic missile program, Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh; and Mohammad Bagheri, a major general in Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and the second-in-command of the armed forces after the Iranian leader.
In addition, at least 11 of the Islamic Republic’s top nuclear scientists were assassinated by Israel in the course of the 12-day war.
Israel repeatedly stated during the war that it was not after a “regime change” in Iran. However, Defense Minister Israel Katz acknowledged after the ceasefire that they wanted to kill Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, but the opportunity never presented itself. This and the attempt on Pezeshkian’s life show that Israel was indeed looking for some form of a political change in Tehran.
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