IDF CHIEF: I’ve ordered preparation of plans to thwart Iran’s nuke program

IDF CHIEF: I’ve ordered preparation of plans to thwart Iran’s nuke program.


IDF Chief of Staff Aviv Kohavi speaks at a ceremony in the military's Kirya headquarters in Tel Aviv on June 18, 2020. (Israel Defense Forces)

IDF Chief of Staff Aviv Kohavi says he has directed the military to prepare operational plans for the possibility that it will need to strike Iran to block its nuclear program.

“Iran can decide that it wants to advance to a bomb, either covertly or in a provocative way. In light of this basic analysis, I have ordered the IDF to prepare a number of operational plans, in addition to the existing ones. We are studying these plans and we will develop them over the next year,” Kohavi says.

He adds: “The government will of course be the one to decide if they should be used. But these plans need to be on the table, in existence and trained for.”

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Iran sentences Iranian-American to prison on spying charges

An Iranian-American has been sentenced to prison on spying charges, Iran’s judiciary reports, the latest dual national held in the country amid tensions with the West.

Iran’s judiciary does not name the man sentenced, but says he had been free on bail and re-arrested while trying to flee the country. Many prisoners in Iran have been out on bail amid the ongoing coronavirus pandemic in the country.

Judiciary spokesman Gholamhossein Esmaili says the man had been convicted on espionage charges and of providing military information to foreign countries. Esmaili does not elaborate.

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