The mountain fortress Israel must destroy to topple Iran's nuclear program
The events of the past few days appear to have proved that Israel has near-total air superiority over Iran. Iranian armed forces have been powerless to counter the Israeli airstrikes that have destroyed critical buildings and wiped out swathes of the Islamic Republic's military leadership.
At least 14 Iranian nuclear scientists have also been killed by the unilateral operation, codenamed Rising Lion, which appears aimed at decapitating the country's nuclear program.
One key site remains relatively unscathed, however: the Fordow Fuel Enrichment Plant. Located 30 kilometres from the ancient, central city of Qom, and about 160 kilometre south of Tehran, Fordow is one of two nuclear enrichment sites in the country. The other, in Natanz, was reportedly partially destroyed in the initial attacks.
Hidden in the mountains, its key buildings buried deep underground, Fordow is an altogether more challenging target. Ringed by anti-air defences, it has become a symbol of Iranian defiance as well as its technological ingenuity. If Israel is truly to dismantle Iran's nuclear capabilities, it must disable Fordow.
That's because here, uranium is enriched in centrifuges at up to 60 per cent, a shade under the purity needed to build a nuclear weapon.
'The entire operation ... really has to be completed with the elimination of Fordow,' Israeli ambassador to the United States Yechiel Leiter told reporters on Friday. A day later, Iranian sources reported that Fordow had been attacked, but with limited damage.
'The be-all and end-all of Iran's nuclear operation'
Analysts have described the mountainous fortress, which sits within an Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps base, as 'the be-all and end-all of Iran's nuclear operation'.
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"This issue will be very high on the agenda of the G7 summit," Merz told reporters. Before leaving for the summit on Sunday, US President Donald Trump was asked what he was doing to de-escalate the situation. "I hope there's going to be a deal. I think it's time for a deal," he told reporters. "Sometimes they have to fight it out." Iran has told mediators Qatar and Oman that it is not open to negotiating a ceasefire while it is under Israeli attack, an official briefed on the communications told Reuters on Sunday. Explosions shook Tel Aviv on Sunday during Iran's first daylight missile attack since Israel's strike on Friday. Shortly after nightfall, Iranian missiles hit a residential street in Haifa, a mixed Jewish-Arab city, and in Israel's south. In Bat Yam, a city near Tel Aviv, residents braced on Sunday evening for another sleepless night after an overnight strike on an apartment tower. 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Trump has lauded Israel's offensive while denying Iranian allegations that the US has taken part and warning Tehran not to widen its retaliation to include US targets. Iranian missiles have struck Israel's Tel Aviv and the port city of Haifa, destroying homes and fuelling concerns among world leaders at this week's G7 meeting that the battle between the two old enemies could lead to a broader regional conflict. Israeli media reported that three people were killed in the country's centre on Monday while dozens more were wounded in the overnight strikes. Search and location operations were underway in the northern city of Haifa where around 30 people were wounded, emergency authorities said, as dozens of first responders rushed to the strike zones. Fires were seen burning at a power plant near the port, media reported. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said on X hundreds of people had been forced to shelter because of Iranian ballistic missiles. Live video footage also showed several missiles over Tel Aviv and explosions could be heard there and over Jerusalem. Some residential buildings in Tel Aviv had been struck, Reuters witnesses said. Tehran has launched several waves of attacks on Israel in retaliation for Israel's pre-emptive strikes targeting Iran's nuclear and ballistic missile programs that began on Friday. Iran's Revolutionary Guards said the latest attack employed a new method that caused Israel's multi-layered defence systems to target each other. "The initiatives and capabilities used in this operation, despite the comprehensive support of the United States and Western powers and the possession of the most up-to-date and newest defence technology, led to the successful and maximum hitting of the missiles on the targets in the occupied territories," it said. At least 10 people in Israel, including children, were killed in earlier strikes, authorities said. The death toll in Iran had reached at least 224, with 90 per cent of the casualties reported to be civilians, an Iranian health ministry spokesperson said. Group of Seven leaders began gathering in the Canadian Rockies on Sunday with the Israel-Iran conflict expected to be a top priority. German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said his goals for the summit include for Iran to not develop or possess nuclear weapons, ensuring Israel's right to defend itself, avoiding escalation of the conflict and creating room for diplomacy. "This issue will be very high on the agenda of the G7 summit," Merz told reporters. Before leaving for the summit on Sunday, US President Donald Trump was asked what he was doing to de-escalate the situation. "I hope there's going to be a deal. I think it's time for a deal," he told reporters. "Sometimes they have to fight it out." Iran has told mediators Qatar and Oman that it is not open to negotiating a ceasefire while it is under Israeli attack, an official briefed on the communications told Reuters on Sunday. Explosions shook Tel Aviv on Sunday during Iran's first daylight missile attack since Israel's strike on Friday. Shortly after nightfall, Iranian missiles hit a residential street in Haifa, a mixed Jewish-Arab city, and in Israel's south. In Bat Yam, a city near Tel Aviv, residents braced on Sunday evening for another sleepless night after an overnight strike on an apartment tower. Images from Tehran showed the night sky lit up by a huge blaze at a fuel depot after Israel began strikes against Iran's oil and gas sector - raising the stakes for the global economy and the functioning of the Iranian state. In Washington, two US officials told Reuters that Trump had vetoed an Israeli plan in recent days to kill Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. When asked about the Reuters report, Netanyahu told Fox News on Sunday: "There's so many false reports of conversations that never happened, and I'm not going to get into that." "We do what we need to do," he said. Israel began the assault with a surprise attack on Friday that wiped out the top echelon of Iran's military command and damaged its nuclear sites, and says the campaign will escalate in the coming days. The intelligence chief of Iran's Revolutionary Guards, Mohammad Kazemi, and his deputy were killed in attacks on Tehran on Sunday, Iran's semi-official Tasnim news agency said. Trump has lauded Israel's offensive while denying Iranian allegations that the US has taken part and warning Tehran not to widen its retaliation to include US targets. Iranian missiles have struck Israel's Tel Aviv and the port city of Haifa, destroying homes and fuelling concerns among world leaders at this week's G7 meeting that the battle between the two old enemies could lead to a broader regional conflict. Israeli media reported that three people were killed in the country's centre on Monday while dozens more were wounded in the overnight strikes. Search and location operations were underway in the northern city of Haifa where around 30 people were wounded, emergency authorities said, as dozens of first responders rushed to the strike zones. Fires were seen burning at a power plant near the port, media reported. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) said on X hundreds of people had been forced to shelter because of Iranian ballistic missiles. Live video footage also showed several missiles over Tel Aviv and explosions could be heard there and over Jerusalem. Some residential buildings in Tel Aviv had been struck, Reuters witnesses said. Tehran has launched several waves of attacks on Israel in retaliation for Israel's pre-emptive strikes targeting Iran's nuclear and ballistic missile programs that began on Friday. Iran's Revolutionary Guards said the latest attack employed a new method that caused Israel's multi-layered defence systems to target each other. "The initiatives and capabilities used in this operation, despite the comprehensive support of the United States and Western powers and the possession of the most up-to-date and newest defence technology, led to the successful and maximum hitting of the missiles on the targets in the occupied territories," it said. At least 10 people in Israel, including children, were killed in earlier strikes, authorities said. The death toll in Iran had reached at least 224, with 90 per cent of the casualties reported to be civilians, an Iranian health ministry spokesperson said. 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