Satellite photos show damage to two Iranian bases from the Israeli attack

Israel’s Saturday attack on Iran damaged facilities at a secret military base southeast of the country’s capital that experts have linked in the past to the former nuclear weapons programas well as another base linked to its missile program, satellite photos analyzed by The Associated Press showed.

Some of the damaged buildings were in Iran Parchin military basewhere the International Atomic Energy Agency suspects that Iran has in the past conducted tests with explosives that could activate a nuclear weapon.

Iran has long maintained that its nuclear program is peaceful, although the IAEA and Western intelligence agencies say Tehran had an active weapons program until 2003.

The other damage could be seen nearby Khojir military baseAnalysts say it hides an underground tunnel system and missile production sites.

The Iranian military has not acknowledged damage at Khojir or Parchin from the Israeli attack early Saturday, although it said the attack killed four Iranian soldiers working in the country’s air defense systems.

Iran’s mission to the United Nations did not immediately respond to a request for comment, nor did the Israeli military.

However, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei told an audience on Sunday that the Israeli attack “should not be exaggerated or downplayed.”

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said separately on Sunday that the Israeli strikes were “precise and powerful” and that the barrage “achieved all its targets.”

It remains unclear how many locations in total were targeted by the Israeli attack. No images of the damage have been released by the Iranian military so far.

Iranian officials have identified the affected areas as being in Ilam, Khuzestan and the provinces of Tehran.

Burned fields were seen on satellite images from Planet Labs PBC on Saturday around Iran’s Tange Bijar natural gas production site in Ilam province, although it was not immediately clear if this was related to the attack. Ilam province is located on the Iran-Iraq border in western Iran.

The most striking damage was seen in the images from Planet Labs of Parchin, about 40 kilometers southeast of central Tehran, near the Mamalu Dam. There, one structure appeared to be completely destroyed, while others appeared damaged in the attack.

In Khojir, about 20 kilometers from central Tehran, satellite images showed damage to at least two structures.

Analysts including Decker Eveleth of the Virginia-based think tank CNA, Joe Truzman of the Washington-based Foundation for Defense of Democracies and former United Nations weapons inspector David Albright, as well as other open source experts, first identified the damage to the bases.

The locations of the two bases correspond to videos obtained by the AP after which Iranian air defense systems fired into the area early on Saturday.

In Parchin, Albright’s Institute for Science and International Security identified the destroyed mountainside building as “Taleghan 2.”

It said an archive of Iranian nuclear data previously seized by Israel identified the building as home to “a smaller, elongated high explosive chamber and a flash X-ray system to investigate small-scale high explosive tests.”

“Such tests may involve explosives that compress a core of natural material uraniumsimulating the detonation of a nuclear explosive,” according to a 2018 report from the institute.

In a message posted early Sunday on the social platform what the hasty and covert renovation efforts following the IAEA’s request for access to Parchin in 2011.”

It was unclear early Saturday what equipment might have been in the “Taleghan 2” building. There were no Israeli attacks on Iran’s oil industry, nor on its nuclear enrichment sites or nuclear power plant Bushehr during the attack.

Rafael Mariano Grossi, head of the IAEA, confirmed this on X, saying: “Iran’s nuclear facilities have not been affected.”

“Inspectors are safe and continuing their vital work,” he added. “I urge caution and restraint in actions that could endanger the safety and security of nuclear and other radioactive materials.”

Other buildings destroyed in Khojir and Parchin likely included a warehouse and other buildings where Iran used industrial mixers to create the solid fuel needed for its extensive arsenal of ballistic missilesEvelet said.

In a statement issued immediately after the attack on Saturday, the Israeli military said it was targeting “missile production facilities used to produce the missiles that Iran has fired at the State of Israel over the past year.”

Destroying such sites could seriously disrupt Iran’s ability to produce new ballistic missiles to replenish its arsenal after the two attacks on Israel. Iran’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard, which oversees the country’s ballistic missile program, has remained silent since Saturday’s attack.

Iran’s total arsenal of ballistic missiles, which also includes shorter-range missiles that cannot reach Israel, was estimated by General Kenneth McKenzie, then commander of the Iranian army, at “more than 3,000.” The United States Army Central Commandin testimony before the US Senate in 2022. Since then, Iran has fired hundreds of missiles in a series of attacks.

No videos or photos were posted on social media of missile parts or damage in civilian neighborhoods after the recent attack – indicating that the Israeli strikes were far more accurate than Iran’s ballistic missile attacks on Israel in April and October. Israel relied on rockets fired from aircraft during its attack.

However, one factory appeared to be affected in Shamsabad Industrial City, just south of Tehran, near Imam Khomeini International Airport. Online videos of the damaged building matched an address for a company known as TIECO, which advertises itself as building advanced machinery used in Iran’s oil and gas industry.

Iran and Israel have regularly engaged in attacks and threats during the deadly war in Gaza, which has been going on since October 7 last year. Israel has carried out attacks on Iranian interests inside Iran and abroad, while Tehran has responded with several retaliatory attacks.

In July, Israel assassinated the head of the Hamas politburo, Ismail Haniyehduring a strike in Tehran. The rocket launches into Israel on October 1 were in response to the assassination, as well as the assassination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah.

Before the war in Gaza, Israel and Iran were engaged in a so-called ‘shadow war’ over the years.