Israeli Sources Say Site Hit in Tehran Was Developing Nuclear Trigger Component

Epoch Times ^ | March 6, 2026 | Yoni Ben Menachem & Oren Shalom

[silent majority rising]

Israel has said that after the destruction of three Iranian nuclear sites by the United States and Israel during the Twelve Day War last June, Iran continued clandestine efforts to restore its nuclear weapons program. On March 3, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said that it “struck and destroyed the secret nuclear headquarters in Minzadehei, located partly underground in the city of Tehran. A team of nuclear scientists was operating covertly at this headquarters.” The military added that during the June 2025 strikes, “the Iranian regime transferred some of its capabilities to secret bunkers and attempted to restore its efforts and conceal them.” Senior Israeli security officials told Epoch Magazine in Israel that at the Minzadehei site that was struck, a team of nuclear scientists—reassembled by Iran from among those who had survived the bombing last year—was working to accelerate the country’s “Weapon Group” project. The purpose of the project is to develop the bomb’s fuzing system–the component responsible for triggering the detonation mechanism—and adapt the weapon for delivery by ballistic missile. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to publicly discuss the details.

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TOPICS: Iran; Israel; War
KEYWORDS: nucleartriggers; nuclearweapons; riiiiiight

[silent majority rising]

This is why Israel and US talked about an immanent threat. They were always two weeks away from being able to to load the nuclear trigger with 90% enriched Uranium. They had enough material to make 11 bombs, but lost the ability to enrich. Although, I suspect they were deciding to enrich enough for one bomb when their labs were blown up yesterday. The morons that are in Congress have always wanted to kick the can down the road and the road has ended.

[af_vet_1981]

Best President !

[JayGalt]

It is good to have a serious president for a change, one that takes protecting America seriously, instead of just as an opportunity to posture, not to mention several who assisted her enemies and fomented conflict to amass fortunes and power for donors.
Add in the business acumen, tenacity and the ability to think outside the box and we have a winner.

[daniel1212]

This is why Israel and US talked about an immanent threat. They were always two weeks away from being able to to load the nuclear trigger with 90% enriched Uranium. They had enough material to make 11 bombs, but lost the ability to enrich. Although, I suspect they were deciding to enrich enough for one bomb when their labs were blown up yesterday. The morons that are in Congress have always wanted to kick the can down the road and the road has ended.

And with multiple actions and threats by Iran and via its proxies then even without a nuke it made itself a target for deterrence.

[Sirius Lee]

Good shootin’!

[Pete Dovgan]

Why do people who enrich uranium for peaceful energy purposes need a ‘nuclear trigger’?

Trump should bomb them, then ask Congress for a declaration of war after. 47 years I have listened to ‘Death to America’, and lies, and seen nothing but targeting Americans. You can bet they will build annd use a bomb if we let them. Anyone supporting the regime in Iran, in side the US, needs to be deported.

[Vermont Lt]

A local college physics lab could produce the mechanism to trigger an atom bomb. The design is eighty years old. But we know it works.

The triggering mechanism is not the key. Even building the bomb would not have been that difficult. The important part of all of this would be the delivery system. I am not sure how Iran figured it would deliver a bomb with 90% of their missiles being shot down. I guess they would do the “smuggling” route on the back of a Toyota pick up truck.

[Kudsman]

In the months leading up to this conflict there were reports of Tehran running low on water. Are there massive fires raging in the city? How are they putting out fires?

[DesertRhino]

Israel said….

[odawg]

“This is why Israel and US talked about an immanent threat.”

I think it is odd that people like to snicker about Trump calling the Iranian government an immminent threat, or that certain people have been calling Iran an imminent threat for decades.

The Iranian government ITSELF has been proclaiming that it is an imminent threat to the United States for decades, and for decades has been proclaiming that the imminent threat will be scaled up to a deadly threat that will eliminate the Great Satan from the earth.

[Getready]

Of course. Back in the days of the Cold war one of the fears was that Russia would float a nuke down some river by a big city.
My guess is that Israel has lots of big cities and targets already with planted bombs ready to be deployed. Some mechanism to get the bomb about one mile up...and detonate.
The trigger would be if Israel got nuked.....

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

A tall man style gun-trigger is not suitable for a ballistic missile. They would have to use an implosion trigger, which is much, much more complicated. The full-up design of the Hiroshima bomb gun-trigger bomb was never tested before it was dropped. The Trinity Test used an implosion trigger because plutonium requires an implosion trigger. The Nagasaki bomb used a plutonium, Hiroshima was uranium. The Hiroshima bomb used eight times as much uranium as would have been necessary for an implosion trigger.

All this effort is wasted unless they kill the personnel with knowledge of the design. BTW, I recently saw Bockscar in the Museum of the United States Air Force in Dayton. they also have the actual bomb cases with the same paint scheme as the originals.

[Zathras]

All modern nuclear weapons us a “neutron generator” instead of the old Polonium-Beryllium system.
The design is speculated to use Deuterium and something similar to how an old vacuum tube functions.
The real design is one of the closely guarded secrets.

The old system does work but you have to constantly replenish Polonium.
Finding enough Polonium for the first bomb was one of the key difficulties in building Little Boy.

[silent majority rising]

I think that yesterday’s raid did just that - killed the designers that were in Tehran. They had escaped June’s ‘cleansing’ and ended up in this secret lab, that was destroyed yesterday.

[bobbo666]

90% would not do it. Need at least 93.

But, it would be easy-peasy to buy 98% or plutonium and enrich your 90% to get a bang. That stuff in on the market.

No country needs enrichment past 40% for any peaceful use.

Part of the deal to call off the bombing would be to forbid any enriched material in the country >40% and buy any over that. We could use that stuff in our own nuclear programs. We did that, the buying, when the USSR imploded. I worked on a contract that did that and some of the material ended up in nuclear reactors out here in CaCaLand. Yes, we turned bombs into plowshares.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

I cannot love Trump and Hesgeth enough. I don’t take pleasure in the death of others, but when the others engage in threatening innocent lives, whether a punk holding a gun to woman’s head, or an Islamist making a nuclear weapon, the world is a better place without them.

[silent majority rising]

I understand not taking pleasure in the death of others, but I also understand the pleasure and satisfaction when Justice is served. These are the days your grandchildren will talk about.

[Paal Gulli]

...The IAEA report said that based on intelligence it has reviewed and its own investigation, Iran had worked on the development of a nuclear explosive device, and tested advanced systems for initiating explosives from multiple points simultaneously in order to create a uniform blast, something required for an effective nuclear explosion.

It added that based on intelligence provided by member states, Iran conducted a test involving the detonation of a powerful hemispherical high-explosive charge. It noted that the materials and dimensions used in the test resembled what would be required to develop a nuclear warhead for the Shahab-3 missile.

“You can produce a nuclear explosive device with a mock core, which can be uranium, but not enriched uranium,” Ephraim Asculai, who worked at the Israel Atomic Energy Commission for more than 40 years, told Epoch Magazine.
“I’m not even sure the term ’mock core’ is good enough, because it is a full-fledged nuclear explosive device in every respect, except that the uranium inside is not enriched to weapons grade,” Asculai said.

“What is called a ‘cold test’ is carried out with this device—you measure all the parameters and examine them in order to confirm that it will work one day. Then, one day, you simply remove the non-enriched uranium core and insert an enriched uranium core, and the device will work....

[[When these websites use a pop-up that opens a couple of seconds after the webpage loads to tell you you have to register to read, sometimes you can capture all the text if you hit {Ctrl}{A} [Select all] and then {Ctrl}{C} [Copy] fast enough. That copies it into the clipboard, then you can paste it in a notepad to read.]]

[silent majority rising]

These Democrats (and Massie and Paul) don’t realize that the first nuclear weapon that Iran would have launched would be at Washington D.C. Goodbye Democrats (and the rest of our Government). As the prophet Crazy Eugene always said, “All in God’s Perfect Timing”.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Completely agree.