Assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists

Incidents are listed here, including one in which the victim survived, and one where assassination has not been confirmed. Ardeshir Hosseinpour On 15 January 2007, Ardeshir Hosseinpour, a professor at Shiraz University, was initially reported to have died of "suffocated by fumes from a faulty gas fire in sleep". Later reports indicated foul play. American private intelligence company Stratfor released a report on 2 February 2007 in which the claim was made, based on "sources very close to Israeli intelligence," that the victim was "in fact a long-time Mossad target." In 2014, Ardeshir's sister, Mahboobeh Hosseinpour, interviewed from Turkey in a conversation arranged by "The New Iran" opposition group, claimed that her brother was murdered by Iran's Revolutionary Guards rather than by Israel, for refusing to participate in "Iran's nuclear enrichment program whose use was for atomic [weapons] purposes." According to Stratfor, Hosseinpour died of radiation poisoning. In January 2011, Iran announced that it had arrested 10 Iranian citizens who had worked with Mossad to carry out the assassination. State television broadcast a confession by Majid Jamali Fashi, who said he acted on the instructions of Mossad and had been trained in Tel Aviv: "I woke up at 4 and made a call, the plan had not changed. I parked the motorbike near the tree," Fashi said in his confession. Ali-Mohammadi's wife said, "I heard the explosion just when I closed the door." Later confirmed genuine by Western intelligence officials, Fashi was executed by Iran in May 2012. Ebrahimi told the BBC that Iran had tortured him into confessing he was a spy. Majid Shahriari and Fereydoon Abbasi , Tehran, Iran. On 29 November 2010, Majid Shahriari, a professor at Shahid Beheshti University was killed by a bomb launched from a motorbike. The assassins had attached a bomb, detonating it from a distance. Shariari's wife, Ghasemi, was a passenger in the car and was injured in the explosion. Darioush Rezaeinejad On 23 July 2011, Darioush Rezaeinejad was shot five times and killed by motorcycle-riding gunmen in front of his home while he was with his wife after they picked up their daughter from kindergarten. His wife was also wounded in the attack. The attack was described by an Israeli intelligence interviewed by Der Spiegel as "the first public operation by new Mossad chief Tamir Pardo". Rezaeinejad's wife, Shohreh Pirani, was also wounded in the attack. "I got off quickly and followed the shooter. After running several meters, I realized that they were shooting at me. I fell down and heard the motorcycle go away," she later said. and working at a "national security research facility." After the assassination, the speaker of Iran's parliament Ali Larijani stated that the United States and Israel had killed Rezaeinejad. The U.S. government, through State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland, rejected the accusation. Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan On 11 January 2012, Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan was assassinated with a "magnetized explosive" attached to the side of his car on his way to work, on the second anniversary of Masoud Ali-Mohammadi's murder at 8:30 am in Shahid Golnabi Street, Seyed Khandan, eastern Tehran. According to Western intelligence sources, Ahmadi Roshan was "a victim of Israel's Mossad." Mohammad Javad Zarif, Iran's foreign minister, suggested that Israel was behind Fakhrizadeh's assassination. Mohammad Mehdi Tehranchi Mohammad Mehdi Tehranchi, an Iranian theoretical physicist and nuclear scientist, was killed on 13 June 2025 during the Israeli strikes on the Iranian nuclear program. Fereydoon Abbasi-Davani Fereydoon Abbasi-Davani was an Iranian nuclear scientist and politician who was head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran from 2011 to 2013. He was killed in an airstrike by Israel on 13 June 2025. He had previously been wounded in an assassination attempt in 2010. Ahmadreza Zolfaghari Daryani Ahmadreza Zolfaghari Daryani was an Iranian professor of nuclear physics and the former dean of the Faculty of Nuclear Sciences at Shahid Beheshti University. He was killed during the June 2025 Israeli strikes on Iran. Akbar Motlebizadeh Akbar Motlebizadeh, an Iranian nuclear scientist, faculty member at Shahid Beheshti University, and physics lecturer at Yazd Islamic Azad University, was killed during the Israeli attacks on Iran on 13 June 2025 at the start of the Twelve-Day War. Seyed Amir Hossein Feghhi Seyed Amir Hossein Feghhi was a prominent Iranian nuclear engineer and academic, recognized for his significant contributions to the field of nuclear science and engineering. He was assassinated during the Israeli attack on Iran in June 2025. == Alleged perpetrators ==

There has been speculation about the identity of the perpetrators. Iran blamed Israel and the U.S. for the assassinations. Mahmoud Alavi, Iran's intelligence minister, said the person who planned the killing was "a member of the armed forces" indirectly suggesting that the perpetrator might have been from the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). Other suspects included Iranian opposition groups such as intelligence operatives from Arab countries opposed to the Iranian government, and the United States. Also, other groups such as the MEK have been accused, although a senior State Department official later denied their involvement. In early 2011, Majid Jamali Fashi confessed to the killing of Masoud Alimohammadi on Iranian state television, saying that he had trained for the operation at a Mossad facility near Tel Aviv. Fashi was executed in May 2012. That month, Iranian authorities announced the arrest of another 14 Iranians eight men and six women described as an Israeli-trained terror cell responsible for five of the attacks on Iranian scientists. According to Time magazine, Western intelligence officials confirmed the cracking of two Mossad-backed espionage rings by Iranian intelligence. Officials in the Obama administration also reportedly confirmed Israeli involvement. Israeli defence minister Moshe Ya'alon said in an interview with Der Spiegel, "Ultimately it is very clear, one way or another, Iran's military nuclear programme must be stopped ... We will act in any way and are not willing to tolerate a nuclear-armed Iran. We prefer that this be done by means of sanctions, but in the end, Israel should be able to defend itself." Ya'alon added that he was not responsible "for the life expectancy of Iranian scientists." The assassination campaign against Iranian nuclear scientists reportedly ended in 2013 following pressure on Israel from the Obama administration to stop the attacks during negotiations with Iran to restrict its nuclear programme. Mossad officials also reportedly concluded that the attacks were "too dangerous" for valuable intelligence operatives in Iran. The organisation has since reportedly instructed its Iranian spy network to concentrate on finding evidence of Iranian breaches of its nuclear-restriction agreements. Opposition sources in Iran claim that the Iranian government killed Massoud Ali-Mohammadi because he supported them. On June 2025, Israeli airstrikes targeted key Iranian nuclear sites. Among those confirmed dead were Fereydoun Abbasi-Davani, former head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, along with Mohammad Mehdi Tehranchi, Ahmad Reza Zolfaghari Daryani, and Abdolhamid Minouchehr. The strikes were widely reported as part of a broader Israeli operation targeting Iran’s military and nuclear infrastructure. == Reactions ==

The U.S. government condemned the assassinations without implicating any party. However, some American politicians supported the killings. Former speaker of the House Newt Gingrich supported "taking out [Iranian] scientists," and presidential candidate Rick Santorum called the killings "a wonderful thing." Following the first strikes of the Twelve-Day War by Israel, Iran responded with a barrage of missiles at Israel. Iran’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, warned that Israel would face a “bitter and painful” fate in response to the attacks. ==Effect==

In an interview with Israeli journalist Ronen Bergman, former CIA director Michael Hayden said that the most effective method employed to stop the Iranian nuclear program had been the assassinations of Iranian nuclear scientists. The assassinations eliminated people with valuable knowledge and experience and forced the Iranian government to implement strict security measures such as hunting for Mossad moles, screening equipment for viruses, and assigning bodyguards to scientists, which delayed the program by years, and caused many Iranian scientists to leave the program out of fear that they could be targeted. ==In film==

• Bodyguard () (2016) — Iranian film by Ebrahim Hatamikia about a government bodyguard who protects a nuclear scientist. ==See also==