Israel planned but failed to assassinate Iran’s Leader, government heads: Ex-Parliament speaker
A senior advisor to the Leader of the Islamic Revolution, Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei, has revealed that Israel had plotted to attack a high-level meeting of Iranian officials—including heads of government—and later target the Leader himself, but the scheme was successfully foiled.
“The enemy’s plan in this war was to target IRGC commanders and key national centers simultaneously. They believed they could pressure certain officials into abandoning the establishment through threats,” Ali Larijani said in a televised interview on Sunday.
Larijani, who served as Parliament speaker between 2008 and 2020, further revealed that during the war, Israel had attempted to intimidate a range of Iranian officials, including politicians, military officers, and security personnel.
“On Friday, they contacted me and gave me 12 hours to leave Iran or get out of Tehran—or else, they said, I’d meet the same fate as martyrs like [Chief of Staff of Iran’s Armed Forces Major General Mohammad Hossein] Bagheri and [commander of Iran’s top military headquarters Major General Gholam-Ali] Rashid. But I gave them the answer they deserved,” he said.
Referring to the US aggression against Iran’s peaceful nuclear sites of Fordow, Natanz, and Isfahan, Larijani dismissed the move as a “face-saving” gesture, saying, “let them be happy about that.”
Pointing to Iran’s retaliation against the US aggression on Iranian soil, Larijani said, “out of 14 Iranian missiles, 6 struck the American base [in Qatar] – and they hit hard, each carrying a 400kg warhead.”
US President Donald Trump, trying to save face, claimed “only one missile hit,” he said, adding let him “enjoy his delusions.”
Senior Iranian clerics have said that any attack or threat to the leadership and religious authority is tantamount to a war crime.
The Israeli regime launched its unprovoked aggression on the Islamic Republic on June 13, with American backing, assassinating several top-ranking military commanders, scientists, and many other ordinary civilians, including women and children.
On the same day, Iranian armed forces, spearheaded by the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC), launched an unprecedented retaliatory campaign against the Israeli regime known as Operation True Promise III.
After more than a week into the war, the US decided to finally make its collaboration with the Israeli regime official, with direct intervention in the war that the Israeli regime has been losing.
On June 22, the United States joined the Israeli regime in the assault and bombed three Iranian nuclear sites in a grave violation of the United Nations Charter, international law, and the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
A day later, Iran launched a wave of missiles at al-Udeid air base in Qatar—the largest American military base in West Asia—in retaliation for the US aggression.
As the Iranian armed forces pounded Israel and its military and industrial infrastructure, using many new-generation missiles that precisely hit the designated targets, the embattled regime was forced to unilaterally cease its aggression against Iran on June 24.
Following the unilateral move, Iran too, halted its retaliatory campaign after carrying out 22 waves of successful attacks against the Israeli-occupied territories.
Elsewhere in his remarks, the Iranian senior official said that the US engaged in five rounds of indirect talks with Iran prior to the aggression solely to mislead Iran, while Israel carried out the strikes in complete coordination with Washington.
“The US used [indirect] talks as a capacity for deception and military aggression,” he noted.
The Israeli regime launched its aggression on Iran just two days before the sixth round of indirect talks, which were scheduled to take place in Muscat.
