Two years later: Former head of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps' Military Intelligence, Major General Roy Heyman, admitted for the first time openly that Israel was involved in the assassination of the commander of the Quds Force of the Revolutionary Guards, Qassem Soleimani, in January 2020.
Heyman made the remarks to the Intelligence and Security Affairs magazine from the Intelligence Heritage Center - "A Look at Intelligence.".
So far, reports implicating Israel have been attributed only to publications in the foreign press and to foreign entities.
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Soleimani was killed in an airstrike carried out by the US Air Force on Baghdad International Airport.
Heyman said that the assassination was carried out by the Americans, but Israeli intelligence played a part in the operation: "Thwarting Soleimani is an achievement, since our main enemy, in my opinion, is the Iranians. Two significant and important assassinations can be noted during my term. One, as I already mentioned, is of Qassem Soleimani - it is rare to find someone so senior, who is both the architect of the fighting force, both the strategist and the operator, that is rare.
""The second assassination was of Bahaa Abu al-Ata in November 2019, who was a senior commander in the Islamic Jihad forces in the Gaza Strip, using high-quality intelligence.
""In contrast to the size ratio, he also grasped the strategy alongside impressive capabilities for managing an 'operation on the ground.' The measurement is based on the potential for damage, and Soleimani was a figure with great potential for damage to regional stability and was the locomotive of the Iranian consolidation train.".
Regarding the Iranian entrenchment in the region, he said: "We have carried out many foilings and disruptions of money and weapons transfer routes, and the highlight of these efforts is preventing the Iranians from trying to establish roots in Syria. We succeeded in this.".
To the question of how a nuclear bomb can be prevented from Iran, he replied: "There is the possibility of a kinetic attack, at the same time it is possible to have a secret channel, in which they will try to reach an agreement, but there are large gaps between the two sides. The West and the US cannot return to the outline of the previous agreement, because the reality has changed, and there are a series of violations on the part of the Iranians.".
