Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian sustained minor leg injuries in an Israeli air strike targeting a meeting of the Supreme National Security Council in Tehran on June 15, according to senior Iranian official statement.
According to a senior Iranian official, the attack was aimed to assassinate the heads of the executive, legislative, and judicial branches in an attempted government overthrow.
The comments come less than a month after Israel launched its unprecedented June 13 bombing campaign against Iran, killing top military commanders and nuclear scientists.
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian was lightly injured in an Israeli airstrike on June 16, Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)-affiliated Fars News Agency reported on Sunday. Pezeshkian sustained a leg injury when an Israeli missile landed on a building in the western part of Tehran, where a meeting of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council was taking place.
Apart from President Pezeshkian, Parliament Speaker Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, Judiciary chief Mohseni Ejei, and other senior officials were also attending the meeting, the report said.
According to the report, the Israeli operation was modelled after the assassination of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut. Six missiles targeted the building’s entry and exit points to block escape routes and disrupt airflow.
The Iranian officials were present on the lower levels of the building. After the explosions, power to the floor was cut. However, an emergency hatch was prepared in advance, and the officials managed to escape through it after the attack, the Fars report said.
Along with Pezeshkian, some other officials also sustained minor injuries while exiting. The Iranian authorities are now reportedly looking into the possibility of an infiltrator, given the accuracy of the information used in the attack.
Iranian President Pezeshkian had earlier accused Israel of trying to assassinate him. “They did try, yes…They acted accordingly, but they failed,” he told Tucker Carlson in an interview.