Israeli intelligence website claims explosions in Iran caused by failed attempt to affix nuclear warhead to Shahab-3 missile

explosion  near Tehran, Iran

Madison Ruppert, Contributing Writer
Activist Post

Today the Israeli intelligence website DEBKAfile claimed that their usual unnamed sources reported that one of the explosions in Iran was actually caused by a failed attempt to affix a nuclear warhead to a Shahab-3 medium-range ballistic missile.

According to the Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK), an organization listed as a terrorist group by the U.S. State Department, which is oddly characterized as an “Iran exile group” by USA Today, the explosion wasn’t an accidental incident at an ammunition depot but instead was a missile base run by the Revolutionary Guard.

DEBKAfile is a site which is given a disturbing amount of credence given their less-than-stellar track record in terms of accuracy and their highly questionable links to Israeli intelligence agencies like Mossad.

The nature of most of DEBKAfile’s reports is also suspicious, given that they tend to solely cite anonymous, supposedly insider sources.

I could easily claim I have insider sources and publish disinformation based on these “sources” that I have made up, but of course I’m not going to do that because this site is about getting at the truth, not clouding the discussion with even more lies.

Due to the incredibly unreliable nature of all of DEBKAfile’s reports, this claim should be taken with a large grain of salt and not accepted as fact.

DEBKAfile consistently presents the hawkish Israeli position, demonizing Iran, Palestine, and any other nation that stands up to Israel’s crimes.

According to Ronen Bergman, an investigative reporter for Yediot Achronot, DEBKAfile relies on sources with an agenda and even Israeli intelligence officials “do not consider even 10 percent of the site’s content to be reliable”.

“DEBKAfile has frequently promulgated materials put out by rightist elements of the Republican Party, whose worldview is that the situation is bad and is only going to get worse,” Bergman wrote.

Similarly, law professor Michael Dorf of Cornell called DEBKAfile an “alarmist Israeli website trading in rumors”.

Alarmism is DEBKAfile’s specialty and this latest report reflects that. It is my opinion that this kind of information coming from DEBKAfile right now is not purely coincidental.

This could very well be an attempt to drum up a false sense of urgency and a need to strike Iran before they can successfully equip a Shahab-3 with a nuclear payload.

Even though Israel’s minister of strategic affairs, Moshe Yaalon, said in 2010 that Iran was at least three years away from being able to do such a thing, DEBKAfile’s mysterious sources seem to know otherwise.

Seeing how DEBKAfile wrongly predicted a dirty bomb attack on New York City carried out by al Qaeda, why would we believe a single thing they claim to be true that is attributed to their anonymous sources?

“Our sources report increasing evidence that the first explosion was caused by a failed effort to mount a nuclear warhead on a Shahab-3 intermediate-range missile,” DEBKAfile wrote.

What increasing evidence? Well, per usual, there is none, but DEBKAfile draws some tenuous links which, in fact, do not point in the direction of their claims in any way.

The MEK cites similarly dubious sources which, according to group’s spokesman Alireza Jafarzadeh, are “reliable sources inside Iran” who claim the blasts “resulted from the explosion of IRGC [Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps] missiles” at the Modarres Garrison west of the Iranian capital of Tehran.

Keep in mind that the U.S. State Department says that the MEK has carried out a, “Worldwide campaign against the Iranian Government stresses propaganda and occasionally uses terrorist violence.”

While the U.S. State Department is far from a trustworthy and reliable organization (to say the least), I’d rather not rely on intelligence from terrorist groups that clearly have a bone to pick with the Iranian regime.

While the MEK claims to reject violence now, Global Security lists the following attacks as linked to the MEK:

• The series of mortar attacks and hit-and-run raids during 2000 and 2001 against Iranian government buildings; one of these killed Iran’s chief of staff
• The 2000 mortar attack on President Mohammad Khatami’s palace in Tehran
• The February 2000 “Operation Great Bahman,” during which MEK launched 12 attacks against Iran
• The 1999 assassination of the deputy chief of Iran’s armed forces general staff, Ali Sayyad Shirazi
• The 1998 assassination of the director of Iran’s prison system, Asadollah Lajevardi
• The 1992 near-simultaneous attacks on Iranian embassies and institutions in 13 countries Assistance to Saddam Hussein’s suppression of the 1991 Iraqi Shiite and Kurdish uprisings
• The 1981 bombing of the offices of the Islamic Republic Party and of Premier Mohammad-Javad Bahonar, which killed some 70 high-ranking Iranian officials, including President Mohammad-Ali Rajaei and Bahonar Support for the 1979 takeover of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran by Iranian revolutionaries
• The 1970s killings of U.S. military personnel and civilians working on defense projects in Tehran

I don’t know about you, but I wouldn’t bank on the information being supplied by the MEK or the highly inaccurate DEBKAfile.

The spokesman for the IRGC, Ramedan Sharif, said, “This blast is not related to any nuclear tests,” but DEBKAfile cites more unknown sources in an attempt to counter this.

“People gathering on street corners wondered if Israel had attacked Iran’s nuclear sites or destroyed Revolutionary Guards missile bases,” DEBKAfile wrote.

Who are these people? Of course they go unnamed and we are just supposed to take their word for it, as per usual.

They claim that windows were shattered 40 kilometers away from the blasts and were heard in the center of Tehran.

DEBKAfile’s “military and Iranian sources” which are, as always, wholly anonymous, say that “the explosions may have been part of a series carried out by Iranian dissident groups last month.”

More unnamed sources claim that a fire broke out at a warehouse in Tehran on Friday which houses IRGC crowd dispersal gear like rubber bullets and tear gas.

Then a second blast struck a light arms depot at Bidganeh, a military camp several kilometers away from the warehouse allegedly housing IGRC crowd dispersal equipment.

At least 17 IRGC troops were killed in the blast according to Iranian state TV, including a senior commander, Hasan Moghaddam.

While DEBKAfile is claiming that these were not accidents, Iranian lawmaker Parviz Soroori officially ruled out sabotage on the parliament’s website, saying, “No sabotage was involved in this incident. It had nothing to do with politics.”

Hossein Garussi, another Iranian lawmaker, also confirmed the blasts without divulging further details, according to DEBKAfile.

Based on nothing other than the fact that the incidents occurred in a relatively small period of time, DEBKAfile writes, “That both were accidents is hardly credible.”

While I agree that it seems illogical to assume that all of these could be accidents, DEBKAfile’s heavy reliance on “exclusive sources” which are always anonymous and often wrong makes their claim that it was actually the result of a failed attempt to load a nuclear payload onto a Shahab-3 is questionable at best.

The motivation for DEBKAfile to publish this disinformation is clear: drawing world support for a military strike against Iran, despite the total lack of evidence backing up the need for a preemptive strike.

Given that the UK believes an Israeli strike on Iran is coming in just a matter of months, it only makes sense that Israeli intelligence would be attempting to drum up support for their actions.

The attack could potentially have disastrous consequences, evidenced by the grim warning issued by the Russian Foreign Minister to Israel and the Western nations considering an attack on Iran.

I sincerely hope that the world will see through the propaganda and lies and not carry out an attack that very well could lead to World War 3, despite the insistence of Israel and others that Iran is a danger to us all. 

Madison Ruppert is the Editor and Owner-Operator of the alternative news and analysis database End The Lie and has no affiliation with any NGO, political party, economic school, or other organization/cause. If you have questions, comments, or corrections feel free to contact him at [email protected]