(Observer Network News).
Two cases occurred on Iran's main natural gas pipelines earlier this week, and the New York Times quoted two Westerners and an Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps think tank expert on the 16th as saying that the incident was committed by Israel. According to the report, this marks a significant shift in the "shadow war" between the two countries that has been based on land, sea, air and cyber for many years.
In the early morning of the 14th local time, two sections of a major natural gas pipeline in Iran occurred, and the incident occurred in the Boruzhen area of Mahal Mahal-Tiari Province and Safa Shahr Region of Fars Province. The pipeline runs about 1,270 kilometers from the port of Asaluye near the South Pars gas field in the Persian Gulf in the south to several cities along the Caspian Sea coast in the north.
We've never seen anything of this scale and scope. Although the incident did not cause any casualties, Homayoun Farakshahi, a senior energy analyst at Kpler Corp., a market research firm, said that the impact on Iranian energy was very large. According to Iran** and local**, natural gas from residential homes, buildings and major factories in at least five provinces across Iran has been affected.
According to Iran's oil minister, Javad Oji, the pipeline was sabotage. He called ** "sabotage and terrorist attacks" and said the "enemy's" plan was to completely cut off gas flows to several major Iranian cities and provinces during the winter months, stirring up domestic discontent. The head of Iran's national gas company, Saeed Agli, said the other side aims to destroy about 40 percent of Iran's gas transmission capacity.
On February 14, in Iran's Chahamahal-** Tiari province, a major natural gas pipeline in Iran broke out, and flames jumped into the air. Visual China.
No group or individual has claimed to have carried out the sabotage, and it is unclear whether the two sections of the pipeline were blown up by drones, ** devices, or other means, and Iranian officials have not named the suspects. It is reported that this type of ** is relatively rare in Iran. Analysts say Iran's energy infrastructure has been attacked in the past, but those incidents were much smaller in scope and scale.
However, according to the New York Times, two unnamed Westerners and a military strategy analyst at a think tank affiliated with Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps believe that Israel planned and carried it out. Considering that the two sections of the pipeline were attacked at multiple locations at the same time, they believe that the Israeli side had a deep understanding of Iran's energy infrastructure before the attack was launched, and that the operation was well coordinated.
According to the aforementioned Iranian military strategic analyst, because of the complexity and scale of the operation, Iran is convinced that Israel is behind the gas pipeline case, and that the attack will "almost certainly" require the help of Iranian agents to determine where and how to attack, such as providing a time period for guards to patrol the pipeline along the route.
One of the Westerners argued that Israel's attack on Iran's gas pipelines was largely "symbolic." The ** said that an attack of this magnitude is easy for Iran to repair and cause relatively little damage to civilians, but in the context of the spread of conflict in the Middle East, Israel is also using this to send a "stern warning" to Iran, that is, Israel has the ability to cause damage in Iran.
Shahin Modarres, an Iranian and Israeli intelligence expert at the International Security Study Group in Verona, said it showed that Israel's clandestine network operating inside Iran had expanded its list of targets beyond military and nuclear facilities. In his opinion, this is "a major challenge and a blow to the reputation" of Iran's intelligence and security agencies.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's office declined to comment on this, the report said.
In recent years, Israel and Iran have intensified their strategic competition in Iraq, Syria and other regional affairs, and the "shadow war" between the two countries has intensified. Israel has reportedly targeted military and nuclear facilities inside Iran for a long time and has assassinated Iranian nuclear scientists and commanders inside and outside Iran. Israel also launched a cyberattack that crippled the servers of Iran's oil ministry and caused chaos at gas stations across the country.
This article is an exclusive manuscript of the Observer.com, and it is not allowed to be unauthorized and shall not be allowed.