TEL AVIV: Israel on Monday launched a blistering attack on Iran’s energy infrastructure at the South Pars gas field and, in a separate strike, killed Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps (IRGC) intelligence chief Majid Khademi.
Confirming that Khademi was targeted, Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz said: “The Revolutionary Guards are shooting at civilians, and we are eliminating the terrorist leaders.”
Khademi was among 25 persons killed in a wave of US and Israeli airstrikes on Iran on Monday. Iran also fired drones and missiles at targets in the Gulf and Israel. At least two persons were killed in Israel’s Haifa after an Iranian missile struck an apartment late Sunday.
Several senior Iranian security officials have been killed in US-Israeli strikes since the war began, including security chief Ali Larijani and IRGC commander-in-chief Mohammad Pakpour.
Israel also attacked Iran’s main energy source and its nearby infrastructure. Iran’s Fars news agency reported a series of blasts near a refinery in the coastal town of Asaluyeh, the heart of the Iranian gas industry.
The area is part of the South Pars natural gas field, the world’s largest known gas reserve, providing 70 per cent of Iran’s total gas supply. The Israeli Defence Minister said they targeted “the largest petrochemical facility in Iran… responsible for about 50 per cent of the country’s petrochemical production”.
Israel already targeted another facility in the same area in mid-March. Iran responded to that strike by attacking a Qatari gas facility and causing significant damage.
US President Donald Trump had then said he wasn’t informed about the strike, but added that Israel had promised to refrain from striking sensitive Iranian gas facilities in South Pars.
Meanwhile, the US Central Command posted images of the High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS) that provide unrivalled deep-strike capability in combat against the Iranian regime. HIMARS has played a major role in Operation Epic Fury.
In another related development, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has said based on its independent analysis of new satellite imagery and detailed knowledge of the site, it can confirm recent impacts of military strikes close to Iran’s Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant, including one just 75 metres from the site perimeter. The Bushehr plant itself has not been damaged, the IAEA’s analysis of April 5 imagery shows.
The head of Iran’s nuclear energy authority has criticised the IAEA for its perceived failure to act on repeated strikes near the power plant.