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Israeli strikes that killed 9 Iranian scientists follows decade-long Mossad pattern of success targeting Tehran's top nuclear minds
The pre-emptive Israeli strike that reportedly killed nine of Iran's lead nuclear scientists Friday isn't the first time Tel Aviv has successfully targeted Tehran's top experts.
Israel launched large-scale airstrikes against Iran on Friday, effectively assassinating some of the Islamic Republic's top military and scientific leaders, saying it had 'no choice' in light of Iran's rapidly advancing nuclear program and slow-moving talks between Tehran and the US.
Since 2010, the Mossad – the cunning Israeli intelligence agency – has been linked to the precision killings of at least four other Iranian scientists.
5 The portraits of Iranian generals and nuclear scientists killed Friday hangs from a lamppost in capital Tehran.
AFP via Getty Images
The most notorious was the 2020 assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh — a physics professor regarded by Israel and Western officials as the father of Iran's nuclear weapons program.
Mossad masterminded the killing from outside Iran, through an AI machine gun mounted on a nearby truck. The device zoomed in on Fakhrizadeh's face and fired 13 times as he was driving by, killing him in under a minute, while his wife — sitting mere inches away — was untouched.
5 Mohsen Fakhrizadeh founded Iran's nuclear program.
VIA REUTERS
The attack succeeded despite Fakhrizadeh traveling with a security detail of as large as 11 men.
Before that, a series of targeted killings in the early 2000s followed similar patterns, with Mossad taking aim at the scientists on their way to work.
In 2010, Masoud Ali Mohammadi, an Iranian nuclear physicist who lectured at Tehran university, was killed when a bomb strapped to a motorcycle was triggered by remote control outside his home in northern Tehran as he was leaving.
5 Israel launched hundreds of air strikes against Iran this week, targeting its nuclear capacities.
TASNIM NEWS/AFP via Getty Images
Later that year, another nuclear scientist, Professor Majid Shahriari was killed in the capital when men on motorcycles rode up alongside him and attached a bomb to his car.
Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan, the 32-year-old deputy head of Iran's uranium enrichment facility was killed in 2012 in a scenario that mimicked a Hollywood script — when two assassins on a motorbike attached a magnetic bomb to his Peugeot as he rode to work in Tehran.
The strikes this week are believed to have killed at least nine top Iranian nuclear scientists, according to reports.
5 Fereidoun Abbasi, a former head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, was killed Friday.
NurPhoto via Getty Images
Fereidoun Abbasi, a former head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran who survived a previous assassination attempt in 2010, was among the scientists slain Friday.
Mohammad Mehdi Tehranchi, head of Iran's Islamic Azad University in Tehran, was also taken out by the Israelis airstrike on Iran's military command center.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Friday that his objective was to eliminate any Iranian threat to Israel.
5 Mehdi Tehranchi, head of Iran's Islamic Azad University in Tehran, was killed Friday.
Tasnim News Agency
The US and Iran were scheduled to have talks in Oman Sunday about Iran's nuclear program — but Iran's top diplomat said Saturday the talks were now 'meaningless' following the strikes.
