Explosion in Isfahan Reported - Nuclear Facility Hit

It does not take any brilliance to figure out who is happily blowing up Iran’s nuclear assets.  Both the USA and Israel have serious national interests at stake here and it is pretty obvious that the present strategy is to delay actual completion of the threat until a full revolt shakes the mullahs out of power once and for all.

Iran is plausibly one of the easiest countries in which such a strategy can work.  After all, tens of thousands of former Iranian citizens do live abroad and want nothing more than the end of this regime.  More amazingly, they almost all travel back and forth to conduct business way to easily.  It really is too good an opportunity for any intelligence service to either miss or fail to exploit.

While the Arab spring has toppled or shaken governments all around the Arab world, Iran presently appears quiescent.  I think that merely means the plotters are lying low and waiting for the main chance.  There were no plotters elsewhere, but that is unlikely to be true in Iran right now.  After all, all that is needed is a quick trip out of country to meet up for planning sessions.

For once, a regime has every reason to be paranoid.  Their enemies have had years of time and space with which to prepare and the tacit support of both the USA and Israel.

Iran: explosion in Isfahan reported

Widely conflicting reports emerge of apparent explosion in the north-east of Isfahan near where nuclear facilities are located

Isfahan is home to Iran's uranium conversion facility, which operates under IAEA surveillance. Photograph: Caren Firouz/Reuters

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/nov/28/isfahan-explosion-report-iran-nuclear-facilities

Conflicting reports have emerged from Iran over an explosion heard in the central city of Isfahan, close to the country's sensitive nuclear facilities.

Iran's semi-official Isna news agency quoted a judiciary official in Isfahan, saying that an explosion had been heard.

"We heard a sound similar to that of an explosion but we have received no reports about its causes and the consequences so far," said Gholamreza Ansari, in quotes carried by Isna. He said the explosion did not appear to be of any significance.

Iran's semi-official Fars news agency was one of the first media organisations to report the explosion, saying it was heard at 2.40pm local time (1110 GMT). Fars quoted the deputy governor, Mehdi Ismaili, as confirming a sound that the news agency reported was loud enough to be heard across the city. The agency, however, removed the article from its website sometime later.

Ismaili then spoke to another semi-official agency, Mehr, denying his quotes as reported by Fars. "I have heard no sound whatsoever in Isfahan," he said. Ismaili also told the Irna state news agency that he had not spoken to Fars in the first place.

Several residents of Isfahan told the Guardian that they had heard a loud blast. One said that it rattled the windows of their home.

Isfahan is home to Iran's uranium conversion facility (UCF), which operates under IAEA surveillance. Iran's main uranium enrichment facilities are situated in the city of Natanz to the north-east of Isfahan, where many of the country's centrifuges are installed. In recent years, Iran's nuclear activities at Natanz have been at the centre of an international dispute.

Earlier this month, a huge explosion at a missile base in the west of Tehran killed more than 30 members of Iran's revolutionary guards, including Major General Hassan Tehrani Moghaddam, a senior commander described as the architect of the country's missile programme.

In recent years, Iran's nuclear and missile programmes have experienced a series of setbacks in what has been widely seen as a covert war against the Islamic republic.

A second Iranian nuclear facility has exploded, as diplomatic tensions rise between the West and Tehran

BY:SHEERA FRENKEL 

From:The Times 

November 30, 2011 11:00AM

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/a-second-iranian-nuclear-facility-has-exploded-as-diplomatic-tensions-rise-between-the-west-and-tehran/story-e6frg6so-1226209996774

AN IRANIAN nuclear facility has been hit by a huge explosion, the second such blast in a month, prompting speculation that Tehran's military and atomic sites are under attack.

Satellite imagery seen by The Times confirmed that a blast that rocked the city of Isfahan on Monday struck the uranium enrichment facility there, despite denials by Tehran.

The images clearly showed billowing smoke and destruction, negating Iranian claims yesterday that no such explosion had taken place. Israeli intelligence officials told The Times that there was "no doubt" that the blast struck the nuclear facilities at Isfahan and that it was "no accident".

The explosion at Iran's third-largest city came as satellite images emerged of the damage caused by one at a military base outside Tehran two weeks ago that killed about 30 members of the Revolutionary Guard, including General Hassan Moghaddam, the head of the Iranian missile defence program.

Iran condemned over embassy storming

Iran claimed that the Tehran explosion occurred during testing on a new weapons system designed to strike at Israel. But several Israeli officials have confirmed that the blast was intentional and part of an effort to target Iran's nuclear weapons program.

On Monday, Isfahan residents reported a blast that shook tower blocks in the city at about 2.40pm and seeing a cloud of smoke rising over the nuclear facility on the edge of the city.

"This caused damage to the facilities in Isfahan, particularly to the elements we believe were involved in storage of raw materials," said one military intelligence source.

He would not confirm or deny Israel's involvement in the blast, instead saying that there were "many different parties looking to sabotage, stop or coerce Iran into stopping its nuclear weapons program".

Iran went into frantic denial yesterday as news of the explosion at Isfahan emerged. Alireza Zaker-Isfahani, the city's governor, claimed that the blast had been caused by a military exercise in the area but state-owned agencies in Tehran soon removed this story and issued a government denial that any explosion had taken place at all.

On Monday, Dan Meridor. the Israeli Intelligence Minister, said: "There are countries who impose economic sanctions and there are countries who act in other ways in dealing with the Iranian nuclear threat."

Major-General Giora Eiland, Israel's former director of national security, told Israel's army radio that the Isfahan blast was no accident. "There aren't many coincidences, and when there are so many events there is probably some sort of guiding hand, though perhaps it's the hand of God," he said.

A former Israeli intelligence official cited at least two other explosions that have "successfully neutralised" Iranian bases associated with the Shahab-3, the medium-range missile that could be adapted to carry a nuclear warhead. "This is something everyone in the West wanted to see happen," he added.

Iran has repeatedly denied the existence of a nuclear weapons program, and strongly condemned the International Atomic Energy Agency's report last month that accused Iran of trying to build a nuclear weapon.