The shroud of secrecy surrounding Israel’s Twelve Day War is slowly lifting, revealing how years of complex operations deep in Iranian territory paved the way for Israel to mount a devastating surprise attack that obliterated Teheran’s military command, top nuclear scientists, and superior air defenses in the first days of war.
Israel’s spies infiltrated the heart of Iran’s missile and nuclear programs years earlier, assembling mountains of covert intelligence about Tehran’s weapons-building infrastructure, according to intelligence documents shared by Israel with the United States and Britain.
A report on these documents in The Times, a British newspaper, recounted how the Netanyahu government discovered in 2024 that a covert group of nuclear Iranian scientists working under the radar had produced 408 kilograms of uranium enriched to 60%, along with a nuclear industrial infrastructure that had been active for some time.
Iran had thus made a significant leap in its ability to assemble a nuclear device in a shorter time than anyone previously estimated.
In another grave miscalculation, the regime’s nuclear development was not confined to the key sites of Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan as thought.
By the end of 2024, Iran had moved from the research stage of weaponization to creating an advanced explosive and radiation system, running experiments and leading to nuclear capability “within weeks,” according to the report.
The ayatollahs were racing toward the finish line with their genocidal schemes against the Jewish state, all while playing a duplicitous game with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). They were shuttering old nuclear sites, shifting operations underground, and skillfully throwing inspectors off the scent.
The intelligence documents seen by The Times show that Iran was aiming to produce dozens of long-range, surface-to-surface missiles a month, leading to up to 1,000 a year with a reported aim of a stock of 8,000 missiles.
Experts estimate Iran began the war with some 2,000 to 2,500 ballistic missiles. The war strategy was to immediately follow up the missile barrage with a massive ground assault of Iranian forces against military and civilian infrastructure, with nuclear weapons employed to crush any resistance and administer the final death blows.
These revelations align with crucial information gleaned in 2018 from the breathtaking Israeli heist of the Iranian nuclear archive stolen from Teheran. [See Sidebar]
Targeting Iran’s Top Nuclear Scientists
Once it became clear that the nuclear program was advancing to a deadly culmination, Israeli authorities decided to first target the scientists leading that effort.
In a tightly coordinated operation, nine scientists were killed simultaneously in their homes in powerful explosions.
The strikes were precisely synchronized, preventing early warnings that could have resulted from staggered explosions, and enabling the scientists to go into hiding. A tenth Iranian scientist eliminated at a later stage, had in fact been hiding in a safe house.
The attack on the scientists was considered so fantastical by even its planners,” writes the Wall Street Journal, “that it was dubbed Operation Narnia, after the children’s fantasy series by author C.S. Lewis.”
The killings were the culmination of 15 years of efforts to wipe out one of Iran’s most prized assets—the top cadre of scientists who worked on the secret nuclear-weapons program in defiance of international censure.
Most of the scientists killed had hands-on experience in testing and building components of a nuclear warhead, like the detonation systems, high explosives and the neutron sources that trigger the chain reaction.
Among the most important targets was Fereydoon Abbasi-Devani, the former head of the Atomic Agency of Iran and one of the founders of Iran’s nuclear weapons-related work, according to David Albright, president of the Institute for Science and International Security, reported the WSJ.
“Abbasi-Devani was a senior adviser to the Iranian nuclear weapons program, with his scientific work focusing on the development of neutron initiators, which fire neutrons into the core of a weapon to trigger a chain reaction,” the report said. “He survived a car-bomb assassination attempt in 2010 on the same day another Iranian nuclear scientist was killed.”
In a recent TV interview, Abbasi-Devani maintained that Iran had all the knowledge it needed for a nuclear weapon. “If I were asked to build a nuclear bomb, I will build it,” he declared.
Another killed scientist was Mohammad Mehdi Teranchi, who led a unit under Fakhrizadeh focusing on high explosives, which are needed to detonate a nuclear weapon, according to the U.S. Treasury Department.
He later became a professor at the physics department of Shahid Beheshti University, a prestigious Tehran university, where a large number of nuclear scientists, including Abbasi-Devani, were employed, according to Israeli sources.
One of the last targets, Sayyed Seddighi Saber, was head of the key Shahid Karimi Group, which runs explosives-related projects for the regime.
Abbasi-Devani, Saber, Teranchi and the above-mentioned Shahid Beheshti University were all sanctioned by the U.S., along with others, for their nuclear-related work.
“It’s one thing to lose the expertise [of top scientists] slowly over time; you have time to replace them,” said Eric Brewer, who was U.S. national security director for counter-proliferation, quoted in the WSJ article. “But if you’re in the middle of trying to build a bomb, the elimination of these experts is going to pose a much bigger problem.”
Mass Infiltration of Israeli Spies
Israel’s military operations would not have been possible, experts say, without the inside intelligence provided by Iranian nationals recruited by the Mossad, Israel’s spy agency. The Mossad’s methods of recruitment is a tightly guarded secret, but there is no doubt that a special unit of Iranian operatives was critical to the war’s success.
These agents in many cases identified the production of centrifuges—instruments used to enrich uranium—at three sites in Tehran and Isfahan. All were attacked and destroyed by Israel during the conflict.
In addition, many of the Iranian agents had infiltrated the headquarters of Iran’s feared Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRCG), the real power behind the ruling ayatollahs. The IRCG headquarters were demolished by intensive bombing at a later stage of the war.
Another key target was Iran’s air defense systems and radars. Israeli intelligence mapped their locations, and most were hit by the Israeli Air Force in the opening strike.
This gave the IDF full control over Iran’s airspace, allowing U.S. B-2 bombers to fly across the country unhindered, and unleash bunker-busters on the Fordow nuclear site—buried deep within a fortified mountain stronghold.
Meanwhile, hundreds of Mossad agents were conducting a series of covert sabotage operations deep inside Iran to take out air defenses and ballistic missile launchers. These operations spanned central and western Iran, a country more than seventy times the size of Israel.
In central Iran, Mossad commando units had positioned guided weapons systems near Iranian surface-to-air missile launchers. In another part of the country, the Israeli spy agency deployed weapon systems and sophisticated technologies hidden in vehicles.
When the Israeli attack began, these weapons were launched and destroyed Iranian air defense targets.
Mossad also established an attack drone base inside Iran “with drones that were smuggled in long before the operation,” the Israeli intelligence official quoted in The Times said.
The U.S. and Israel were bracing for swift, fierce retaliation from Iran overnight. Due to the shock and disarray on the Iranian side and the successful maneuvers by Israeli spies and pilots—there was an initial eerie silence.
As is well known, when the counterstrike finally came, its impact was miraculously restrained. Though every casualty is a tragedy, the scale of death and destruction fell far short of the catastrophic potential.
‘It Happened Right Before Our Eyes’
Throughout the years of clandestine operations in Iran, the discovery of just one Israeli spy, the interception of just one message among millions, or the slightest suspicion about the unfolding military plans could have triggered catastrophe.
The entire network might have crumbled—hundreds of lives lost, and years of meticulous preparation for a preemptive strike reduced to ashes.
Instead, from thousands of Israeli secret agents, it appears not a single cover was blown, and the complex web of advance operations inside Iran that were crucial to the surprise attack went totally undetected.
In countless spine-tingling moments where the fate of Israel and potentially that of the world hung in the balance, everything that could have possibly gone wrong went miraculously right. That incredible scorecard played no small role in persuading President Trump to give the green light to the B-2 bombers with their 30,000 ton bunker-busters to set out for Iran on a mission to destroy.
In a sign that the watching world understood something uncanny was at play, Iran’s ambassador to France, Amin-Nejad admitted in a tone of incredulity the vast extent of Israel’s infiltration, in an interview last week with France 24.
“The Israelis organized penetrations, transfers of bombs and explosives, and recruited many people from within our country. It happened right before our eyes,” the Iranian ambassador remarked.
Panic In Teheran
The scale of the infiltration of the Iranian regime has heightened panic and paranoia in Tehran, observers say. Over the course of the 12 days of the conflict, Iran arrested dozens of people suspected of spying.
Efforts to hunt Iranian spies for Israel began after the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Iran, with IRGC members suspecting one another of security breaches.
Iranian state media announced last week that Iran’s security forces arrested more than 600 people since Israel’s June 13 attack on suspicion of belonging to an “Israeli spy network”.
The arrested suspects, many of whom could potentially face execution, are accused of planning to use attack drones, building bombs, spying on military sites, and transmitting information to Israel, according to Iranian media.
The reports show men in prison jumpsuits confessing that they were recruited as Israeli spies, along with weapons they were supposedly planning to use. Analysts say the confessions were probably coerced, and an analysis of the images found no evidence of any Israeli-made weapons among the supposed seizures, reports France 24.
In the days after the initial Israeli attack on June 13, Iranian authorities showed numerous images of abandoned vehicles and equipment left behind after their use in Israel’s attack.
They also showed images of spent munitions, including the casings of Israeli-made short-range Spike missiles, along with cars used to transport these missiles and suicide drones deep into Iran.
Authorities also publicized images of Israeli makeshift drone factories within the country – all of which reveals that Israeli intelligence had successfully recruited and infiltrated Iran on a large scale.
Face-Saving Propaganda
Desperate to salvage its shattered image, the Iranian regime is using state-controlled media to showcase two purported “victories”—claiming to have captured “Israeli operatives” and seized their weapons.
The “seized weapons” and arrested “Mossad agents” appear to be staged, the France 24 article says, “as no credible evidence is offered to substantiate these claims.”
In the first incident, dated June 24, 2025, the Iranian ministry of intelligence claimed to have seized 402 drones in two cities in Iran’s Hormozgan province. State media reporting on the seizure broadcast a photograph showing five attack drones with blue batteries.
This was exposed as cheap propaganda when the photo was identified as a picture taken in Ukraine in May by an Associated Press photographer, and shows attack drones made by the Ukrainian army for use against their Russian enemies.
A second Iranian TV report on the supposed seizure of weapons in Hormozgan was just as duplicitous. It showed stacks of commercially available consumer drones in their original packaging, including models that are too small to carry munitions.
The presence of only Iranian-made weapons—and the conspicuous absence of any Israeli or Western arms—reinforces the impression that the so-called “arrests” and “seizures” were staged.
These theatrics mirror the regime’s bombastic claims to the Iranian people, inviting the world’s ridicule as it touts a phantom “victory” over Israel.
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How Israel, in the Dark of Night, Stole Iran’s Nuclear Secrets
One of the Mossad’s most celebrated feats within Iran was the seizure of Iranian nuclear archives from a giant safe in 2018. The top-secret documents, documenting years of work on atomic weapons, warhead designs and production plans, proved the Iranians were violating the terms of the Obama-orchestrated 2015 nuclear deal.
According to the terms of the deal, Iran would limit its nuclear program in return for billions of dollars in sanctions relief and monetary incentives.
Key documents from the trove confirmed what inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) had suspected: the regime was intent on moving ahead with the production of atomic weapons while going to great lengths to pull the wool over the inspectors’ eyes.
The theft operation itself was straight out of a thriller. The agents arrived at the inconspicuous-looking warehouse in a commercial district of Tehran at 10:30 at night on Jan. 31, 2018. They had to disable the alarms, break through two doors, cut through dozens of giant safes and get out of the city with a half-ton of secret materials.
They used torches to cut through the 32 Iranian-made safes, and over the next five hours, before the morning guard shift was due to arrive, seized some 50,000 pages and 163 compact discs of memos, videos and plans.
The Israeli spies almost surely had inside help. They knew which of the 32 safes held the most important information. They manipulated the alarm system, so that it would appear to be working even though it would not alert anyone when the agents arrived.
At exactly 7 a.m., as the Mossad expected, a guard arrived and discovered that the doors and safes were broken. He sounded the alarm, and the Iranian authorities launched a nationwide manhunt for the burglars — enlisting tens of thousands of Iranian security and police personnel.
The search ended in defeat. All the spies made it out of the country.
Incriminating Documents Convince President Trump
In late April, Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu announced the results of the heist, after giving President Trump a private briefing at the White House. He said it was another reason President Trump should abandon the 2015 nuclear deal, arguing that the documents proved the Iranians were lying and had every intention of resuming bomb production.
In one document, one of the scientists warned that their work on neutrons that create the chain reaction for a nuclear explosion must be hidden. “We cannot justify such activities as defensive. Neutron activities are sensitive, and we have no explanation for them. They must be concealed.”
Other incriminating elements in the archive consist of pictures taken inside what were once key facilities in Iran, before the equipment was dismantled in anticipation of IAEA inspections. One set of photos taken by the Iranians shows a giant metal chamber built to conduct high-explosive experiments, in a building at Parchin, a military base near Tehran.
Intelligence agencies had long suspected nuclear activity at the Parchin site, and Iran had refused to allow international inspectors in, saying it was off limits to inspectors and not part of any nuclear experiments.
By the time the IAEA was finally permitted to visit the site in 2015, it was empty, though the agency’s report indicated that equipment appeared to have been removed. The photos show a large chamber that nuclear experts say is tailor-made for the kind of illegal experimental activity that the international inspectors were looking for.
Satellite photographs show that Parchin was so sanitized before the inspectors’ arrival that tons of soil in the area had been removed, to eliminate any traces of nuclear contamination.
A few days after the private briefing President Trump received from Prime Minister Netanyahu on the contents of the archive, he followed through on his longstanding threat to pull out of the accord, repeating that the deal was “defective at its core.”
Experts say the secret archive was critical in exposing the full extent of the Iranian regime’s deceit and its determination to produce nuclear weapons. The 2018 revelations laid the foundation for this month’s joint Israeli-American strikes that crippled Iran’s nuclear program—strikes carried out with the silent consent of world powers that recognized the necessity, yet lacked the courage to act themselves.
