Israel Behind New Attacks on Iran’s Gas Infrastructure; NYT Report Says

Western and Iranian officials noted this Saturday, February 17, 2023, that Israel was responsible for secret attacks on two important gas pipelines inside Iran this week.

In line wit Israel’s endless animosity against Iran, a new report by the New York Times, citing several Western officials and a military strategist affiliated with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, revealed this Sunday that Israel was responsible for secret attacks on two important gas pipelines inside Iran this week.

“Due to Israel attacks on two important gas pipelines inside Iran, gas supply to millions of Iranian citizens was severely disrupted in the middle of winter this week,” the report said.

The officials called Israel’s attack “a great symbolic sabotage” and “a serious warning of the damage that Israel can inflict on Iran,” amid Gaza war.
According to the report, Tel Aviv was also responsible for a “separate explosion on Thursday, February 14, 2024, at a chemical factory on the outskirts of Tehran. However, Iranian officials say the factory explosion was an accident and there is no evidence suggesting that Israel was behind the incident.

On the same day, two explosions also occurred in three Iran’s pipelines, which carry about 57 million cubic meters of natural gas and run more than 1000 kilometers through Fars to Chahar Mahal Bakhtiari provinces. This disruption temporarily affected about one-sixth of Iran’s daily natural gas production and caused gas outages in several regions of the country for hours, the NYT report also noted.

Rebuking the attacks on Iran’s pipelines, Iran’s Oil Minister, Javad Owji, said this Saturday that  “the enemy’s plan was to completely disrupt the flow of gas in winter to several main cities and provinces in our country,” also calling the explosions an “act of sabotage” and “terrorist attacks,” that were aimed to stir domestic discontent inside Iran.

Israel’s attack on Iran was not a new story!

Israel has a long history of assassinating Iranian officials and nuclear scientists and has also been behind many sabotage attempts in several critical infrastructures of Iran, especially nuclear and military facilities in the country.

And this week’s strikes were indeed a notable sign of huge shift in the shadow war between Israel and Iran that has been ongoing from air, land, sea and cyberattack for decades. This is because blowing up part of Iran’s energy infrastructure, relied on by industries, factories and millions of civilians, appeared to open new frontiers in the battel between Tehran and Tel Aviv.

Iran was also targeted by one of the largest terror attacks in its history in January when ISIS militants killed about 100 people in Kerman during a ceremony commemorating the death of Quds Force commander Qassim Soleimani. Following the attack, Iranian officials blamed Israel for being responsible and vowed response.