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\t\t\t\tBy signing up, you agree to the terms<\/a><\/p>\n Pickaxe Mountain was not hit then or in the latest war, although US President Donald Trump has repeatedly threatened to bomb it.<\/p>\n Cohen also said Tuesday \u201cthat 60% enriched uranium is still far from a bomb,\u201d appearing to contradict experts such as David Albright, who say<\/a> 60% enriched uranium can potentially be further enriched to weapons grade in a matter of weeks or even days.<\/p>\n No other quotes from Cohen\u2019s remarks during the forum were released to media outlets.<\/p>\n \t Trump asserted last year that the June 2025 operation \u201cobliterated\u201d Iran\u2019s nuclear capability and set back its nuclear program by decades. But the exact extent of the damage is unknown.<\/p>\n Prior to last year\u2019s strikes, Iran was enriching uranium to 60 percent, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency. That is far higher than necessary for civilian reactor levels, and close to the 90 percent required to build a nuclear weapon.<\/p>\n In a report aired<\/a> on Channel 12\u2019s \u201cUvda\u201d investigative program in January, Cohen said Israel first became aware of what was going on at Fordo in 2010. The Mossad began putting together a grandiose operation that \u2014 Cohen said at the time \u2014 had it been carried out, \u201cwould have been the greatest operation in the history of the country.\u201d<\/p>\n The plan reportedly faced doubts owing to the enormous resources required, its dizzying complexity, the need to mesh delicately synchronized activities, the number of agents required, as well as figuring how to get them out of Iran after the attack went ahead. The Mossad favored using its own home-grown operatives rather than agents enlisted abroad, complicating the mission, which Cohen indicated would have required at least dozens of people.<\/p>\n \t Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was also the premier at the time, was said to have been very keen on the plan and pushed to move ahead with preparations.<\/p>\n However, by the time Cohen became Mossad chief in 2016, the Obama administration had signed a nuclear pact with Iran. Cohen said that by then, he had lost his own previously strong faith that the operation could be carried out, and so it was shelved, with the focus instead put on the Israel Defense Forces to prepare a strike on Iran.<\/p>\n Responding to the report, the Prime Minister\u2019s Office acknowledged that \u201cattack plans [for Fordo] were developed, some of which were not possible because of October 7,\u201d without elaborating.<\/p>\n Cohen has previously given revealing interviews about Israeli espionage activity in and against Iran.<\/p>\n Days after stepping down as Mossad chief in 2021, he gave an extraordinary interview on Israeli television<\/a> in which he provided details of such activity. He intimated that his agency blew up Iran\u2019s underground centrifuge facility at Natanz, gave a precise description of the 2018 operation in which the Mossad stole Iran\u2019s nuclear archive from safes in a Tehran warehouse, confirmed that Iran\u2019s assassinated top nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh had been in Mossad\u2019s sights for years, and said the regime needs to understand that Israel means what it says when it vows to prevent Iran attaining nuclear weapons.<\/p>\n Speaking on \u201cUvda\u201d at the time, Cohen indicated that he was deeply familiar with Iran\u2019s various nuclear sites, and said that given the opportunity, he would take his interviewer, journalist Ilana Dayan,to the underground \u201ccellar\u201d at Natanz<\/a>, where, he said, \u201cthe centrifuges used to spin.\u201d<\/p>\n
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\n\t\tThis handout satellite image provided by Maxar Technologies and dated July 1, 2025, shows an overview of the Fordo Fuel Enrichment Plant complex in central Iran after US airstrikes. (Satellite image \u00a92025 Maxar Technologies \/ AFP)<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/AP21005034144875-640x400.jpg\")
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\n\t\tSpokesman of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, Behrouz Kamalvandi, center, briefs the media while visiting the Fordo nuclear site near Qom, south of Tehran, Iran November 9, 2019. (Atomic Energy Organization of Iran via AP)<\/p>\n
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