Israel accused Iran of planning the bomb attacks on its diplomats’ cars in India and Georgia, heightening concerns that the Jewish state was moving closer to striking its archenemy.
Iran denied responsibility for Monday’s attacks, which appeared to mirror the recent killings of Iranian nuclear scientists that Tehran blamed on Israel.
The blast in New Delhi set a car ablaze and injured four people, including an Israeli embassy driver and a diplomat’s wife; the device in Georgia was discovered and safely defused.
“Iran is behind these attacks and it is the largest terror exporter in the world,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told lawmakers from his Likud Party.
The violence added further tension to one of the globe’s most contentious standoffs. Iran has been accused of developing a nuclear weapons program that Israel says threatens the existence of the Jewish state. Tehran says its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes.
Comments by Israeli officials in recent weeks have raised fears Israel might be preparing to strike Iranian nuclear facilities. While Israel says it hopes that international sanctions can curb Iran’s nuclear program, leaders pointedly note that “all options are on the table” and have warned that time is running out for action.
Israeli military analyst Reuven Pedatzur said Monday’s action was unlikely to have any bearing on whether Israel attacks Iran, calling it an “isolated incident” with rather low impact.
The attackers in India and Georgia appeared to have used “sticky bombs” attached to cars by magnets, similar to weapons used against Iran’s nuclear officials. Netanyahu said Israel had thwarted attacks in recent months in Azerbaijan and Thailand and unspecified other countries.
He vowed to “act with a strong hand against international terror.”
Israeli media reported that the government blamed Iran based on prior intelligence and that security officials feared this could be the start of a wave of attacks against Israeli targets overseas.
Iranian officials rejected Netanyahu’s accusation.
Iranian lawmaker Javad Jahangirzadeh was quoted by the semiofficial Mehr news agency as saying the Israeli charges were meant to provoke the world against Iran and to undermine upcoming nuclear talks between Tehran and the world powers.
Another lawmaker, Avaz Heidarpour, was quoted by Mehr as saying Netanyahu’s allegations were an attempt by Israel to justify future operations against Iran.
“It’s very likely that the Zionist regime is paving the way to carry out an assassination abroad or hit inside Iran. So, they are making preparations for that,” Mehr quoted him as saying.
The New Delhi attack took place just after 3pm a few hundred meters from the prime minister’s residence as the diplomat’s wife headed to the American Embassy School to pick up her children, Delhi Police Commissioner B.K. Gupta said.
When the minivan approached a crossing, she noticed a motorcyclist ride up and stick something on it that appeared to be a magnetic device, he said. The car drove a short distance, there was a loud sound and then an explosion, and the car caught fire, he said.
The blast left the vehicle charred and appeared to blow out its rear door.
“The blast was so powerful, the car behind got damaged as well,” said Monu, a high school student who uses only one name.
The Israeli Ministry of Defense said the woman, Tal Yehoshua-Koren, the wife of a defense ministry official based in New Delhi, suffered moderate shrapnel wounds and was treated at a hospital by Israeli doctors.
Her driver, Manoj Sharma, 42, and two people in a nearby car had minor injuries, Gupta said.
Authorities in Georgia said an explosive device was planted on the car of a driver for the Israeli embassy in the capital of Tbilisi.
Shota Utiashvili, spokesman for the Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs, said the driver noticed a package on his car’s undercarriage and called police, who found and defused a grenade.
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