Israel convinced the United States that Islamic Revolutionary Guard leader Qassem Soleimani posed an “immediate threat” to American soldiers, former Israeli military intelligence chief Tamir Hayman has told Jewish News in an exclusive interview.
Three years ago, American airstrikes killed IRGC leader Qassem Soleimani in Iraq, leading to a near-all out war between Tehran and Washington. Iran still threatens with avenging the assassination, calling it a “terror” attack on an Iranian official.
Hayman has previously admitted that Israel provided intelligence to the U.S. about Soleimani, but his wording “immediate threat” is the same as what U.S. President Trump used when he took responsibility for the attack, suggesting it was that exact piece of Israeli intelligence that led to the decision to assassinate the IRGC leader.
“Soleimani was plotting imminent and sinister attacks on American diplomats and military personnel but we caught him in the act and terminated him,” Trump told reporters at the time.
After Soleimani’s militias had helped defeat Islamic State the U.S. was “standing in his way because he wanted to control the Middle East. So his focus changed from Islamic State to US presence in the region,” Hayman said.
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