Israel provided the United States with intelligence indicating that Iran is considering using chemical weapons against its adversaries, The New York Times reported, citing American and regional officials. Some senior U.S. officials received the intelligence with concern, while others expressed deep skepticism, viewing it as part of a pressure campaign by Benjamin Netanyahu’s government to resume large-scale fighting. Gulf officials questioned the Israeli assessments and said Israel had presented no evidence that Iran is making its chemical arsenal operational. Israel’s Home Front Command did not include chemical-weapons scenarios in this week’s exercises nor distribute protective guidance, and the Israeli military declined to comment. Tehran denies possessing chemical weapons and calls the accusations psychological warfare by Israel and Netanyahu.
Theme: Chemical weapons
Israel has shared with the United States intelligence asserting that Iran is considering the use of chemical weapons against its adversaries, information met with alarm by some American officials, according to The New York Times. According to JFeed, which reports the contents of the article, some US officials expressed deep skepticism about the information’s credibility, and some compared it to the flawed 2002 intelligence on Iraqi weapons of mass destruction. Some American and Gulf officials suggested that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may be trying to draw President Donald Trump back into military action against Iran. According to the newspaper, Trump said he would not order an attack before Tuesday’s midterm elections.
Russia and 17 other countries called on UN Secretary-General António Guterres to review the rules of the mechanism for investigating possible uses of chemical and biological weapons, according to a joint statement published on the Russian Foreign Ministry’s website on Tuesday and reported by Sputnik. The text calls on Guterres to organize a review of the mechanism’s existing rules and procedures, set out in UN General Assembly document A/44/561 of Oct. 4, 1989.
Iran’s ambassador to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), Hadi Farajvand, said US military attacks damaged 111 Iranian petrochemical and pharmaceutical facilities, according to the Tehran Times. According to the account, 60 petrochemical complexes, 44 pharmaceutical factories and seven pharmaceutical facilities were damaged. The statement was made at the 113th session of the OPCW Executive Council, in The Hague, which runs until October 9.