Iranian military site Isfahan targeted by drone attack, Tehran claims

Bomb-carrying drones targeted an Iranian defense factory in the central city of Isfahan overnight, authorities said early Sunday, causing some damage to the factory amid heightened regional and international tensions engulfing the Islamic Republic.

Iran’s defense ministry has not provided information on who is believed to have carried out the attack, which occurred when a refinery fire broke out separately in the country’s northwest and a magnitude-5.9 earthquake nearby, killing three people. came.

However, Tehran has been the target of suspected Israeli drone strikes amid a shadow war with its Middle Eastern rival as its nuclear deal with world powers collapsed.

Meanwhile, tensions remain high with neighboring Azerbaijan after a gunman attacked that country’s embassy in Tehran, killing its security chief and wounding two others.

Details about the attack in Isfahan, which took place around 11:30 p.m. local time on Saturday, remained scarce. A statement from the Department of Defense describes that three drones were launched at the facility, two of which were successfully shot down.

A third apparently managed to hit the building, causing “minor damage” to the roof and not injuring anyone, the ministry said.

“That was a drone, wasn’t it?”

The English-language arm of Iran’s state television, Press TV, aired a mobile phone video that apparently showed the moment the drone struck along the busy Imam Khomeini Expressway running northwest out of Isfahan, one of many ways drivers get to the holy place. city ​​of Qom. and Tehran, the capital of Iran.

A small crowd gathered, attracted by anti-aircraft fire, and watched as an explosion and sparks hit a dark building.

“Oh my god! That was a drone, wasn’t it?” shouts the filming man. “Yes, it was a drone.”

Who fled there after the strike.

That footage of the strike, as well as footage of the aftermath, matched a location on Minoo Street in northwestern Isfahan, near a shopping center with a carpet and electronics store.

Iran’s defense and nuclear sites are increasingly surrounded by commercial properties and residential areas as the country’s cities continue to expand.

Some locations also remain incredibly opaque about what they produce, displaying only a sign with the logo of the Department of Defense or the paramilitary Revolutionary Guards.

The Department of Defense merely referred to the site as a “workshop,” without elaborating on what made it.

Some 350 kilometers south of Tehran, Isfahan is home to both a major air base built for its fleet of US F-14 fighter jets and its Nuclear Fuel Research and Production Center.

The attack comes after Iran’s intelligence ministry claimed in July it broke off a plot to target sensitive locations around Isfahan.

A clip aired on Iranian state television in October contained alleged confessions from alleged members of Komala — a Kurdish opposition party exiled from Iran and now living in Iraq — who said they planned to launch a military air and space facility in Isfahan after they were trained. by Israeli Mossad intelligence.

Activists say Iran’s state television has broadcast hundreds of coerced confessions over the past decade. Israeli officials declined to comment on the attack.

Separately, Iranian state television said a fire had broken out at an oil refinery in an industrial area near the northwestern city of Tabriz.

It said the cause was not yet known as it showed footage of firefighters trying to put out the blaze. Tabriz is located about 520 kilometers northwest of Tehran.

State television also said the 5.9-magnitude earthquake killed three people and injured 816 others in rural West Azerbaijan province, damaging buildings in many villages.