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Targeting Iran’s Leaders, Israel Found a Weak Link: Their Bodyguards
The New York Times ^ | Aug. 30, 2025Updated 11:08 a.m. ET | Farnaz Fassihi, Ronen Bergman and Mark Mazzetti

Posted on 08/30/2025 11:27:39 AM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum

The meeting was so secret that only the attendees, a handful of top Iranian government officials and military commanders, knew the time and location.

It was June 16, the fourth day of Iran’s war with Israel, and Iran’s Supreme National Security Council gathered for an emergency meeting in a bunker 100 feet below a mountain slope in the western part of Tehran. For days, a relentless Israeli bombing campaign had destroyed military, government and nuclear sites around Iran, and had decimated the top echelon of Iran’s military commanders and nuclear scientists.

The officials, who included President Masoud Pezeshkian, the heads of the judiciary and the intelligence ministry and senior military commanders, arrived in separate cars. None of them carried mobile phones, knowing that Israeli intelligence could track them.

Despite all the precautions, Israeli jets dropped six bombs on top of the bunker soon after the meeting began, targeting the two entrance and exit doors. Remarkably, nobody in the bunker was killed. When the leaders later made their way out of the bunker, they found the bodies of a few guards, killed by the blasts.

The attack threw Iran’s intelligence apparatus into a tailspin, and soon enough Iranian officials discovered a devastating security lapse: The Israelis had been led to the meeting by hacking the phones of bodyguards who had accompanied the Iranian leaders to the site and waited outside.

Israel’s tracking of the guards has not been previously reported. It was one part of a larger effort to penetrate the most tightly guarded circles of Iran’s security and intelligence apparatus that has had officials in Tehran chasing shadows for two months.

(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Hamas; Hezbollah; Iran; Yemen
KEYWORDS: farnazfassihi; hamas; hezbollah; houthis; iran; markmazzetti; masoudpezeshkian; newyorkslimes; newyorktimes; ronenbergman; yemen

1 posted on 08/30/2025 11:27:39 AM PDT by E. Pluribus Unum
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

Remarkably, nobody in the bunker was killed. “

Almost, better luck next time Bibi.


2 posted on 08/30/2025 11:35:11 AM PDT by gibsonguy ( )
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To: E. Pluribus Unum; nopardons

How the hell can one hate Israel when they do stuff like this, not to mention the PAGERS!


3 posted on 08/30/2025 11:38:15 AM PDT by BobL
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

The LA Times should research with a simple google search under former VP protection

Former VPs are entitled to SS protection for no longer than six months after leaving office

Propagandists


4 posted on 08/30/2025 11:46:17 AM PDT by stanne (Because they were mesmerized by Obama, the man for whom this was named, whose name they left out of )
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To: E. Pluribus Unum

IDF just bought a toilet paper company.


5 posted on 08/30/2025 12:08:35 PM PDT by bunkerhill7 (Don't shoot until you see the whites of their lies)
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To: BobL

Just be thankful we’re on their side.


6 posted on 08/30/2025 1:50:49 PM PDT by DIRTYSECRET
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