Iran’s top security official Ali Larijani strolled confidently in dark sunglasses and a black coat during a rally of regime loyalists in central Tehran on Friday. This was his first public appearance in a war in which he was a known target. “Brave men. Brave officers. Brave leaders. This combination cannot be beat,” he later wrote on X.
Four days later, he was dead. On Tuesday morning, Israel’s intelligence services found Larijani gathered with other officials at a base on the outskirts of Tehran. killed him with a missile attack.
That same night, Israel received information from ordinary Iranians that leader of the feared Basij militiaGholamreza Soleimani was hiding with his representatives in a tent in a wooded area of Tehran. Israel was expecting such a payoff after blowing up Basij headquarters and command posts for more than two weeks, forcing its members to gather in the open. Soleimani was also attacked and killed.
Israeli and American leaders initially said that war with Iran would create conditions for Iranians to overthrow their regime. murders early tuesday There were milestones in that campaign that were made possible by the rapidly increasing damage caused by air strikes and the growing harvest of intelligence about potential targets.
Along with the killing of thousands of regime members From top leaders to street-level chatter-Iranians are reporting that a sense of chaos is beginning to take hold. Security forces are on edge and on the run as they threaten protesters to stay off the streets and direct attacks on the US, Israel and Arab neighbors in the Persian Gulf.
Detailed target lists and war-damage reports seen by the Wall Street Journal provide an inside look at the massive efforts being made to eliminate them.
Documents show the effort began in the early days of the war and continued to grow. Israel is following them from their headquarters to security centers and then to hideouts under bridges in an effort to disrupt the activities of the security forces and show the Iranians that their enforcers are being taken out.
So far Israel says it has dropped more than 10,000 munitions on thousands of different targets, including more than 2,200 belonging to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Basij and other internal security forces. He believes thousands of people have been killed or injured.
The advanced technology deployed by Israel and the penetration of Iranian society by its agents combine to pose the greatest threat yet to a deeply entrenched regime.
But decades of military experience shows that it is difficult, if not impossible, to remove a government from power. And if the Iranian regime survives, it may emerge bolder and more dangerous. “This would be a clear victory for the regime under both predictable and unexpected circumstances,” said Farzin Nadimi, an Iran-focused senior fellow at the Washington Institute, a US-based think tank.
Israel started the war by shooting at the heart of the regime, assassination of supreme leader Ali Khamenei took the first salute at his compound and, working with the US, immediately destroyed most of Iran’s missile launchers and destroyed its air defenses.
Then they divided the responsibilities. The US focused on Iran’s military and industrial power, and Israel went after the structures of internal control.
By the second day, Israeli warplanes were systematically attacking the headquarters and associated command centers. Revolutionary Guard home defense weaponsBasij militia and special police forces.
Documents reviewed by the Journal show that the attacks targeted everything from Tharalla, the Revolutionary Guard unit responsible for protecting the capital, to police stations in Tehran’s neighborhoods. Israel targeted locations where Israeli intelligence determined regime personnel were present.
Then the goals expanded. Israeli intelligence revealed that Iran had planned to mobilize local sports complexes in case its internal security forces’ facilities were destroyed.
Israel watched the sites fill and then attacked them before the end of the first week. Those attacks were among the deadliest of the war, according to a war-damage assessment seen by the Journal, killing hundreds of members of the security services and the military, most of whom were killed at Azadi Stadium, a major venue for football games.
The footage showed security officers lying on the sidewalk outside the second stadium, according to video verified by Storyful, a social-media intelligence firm owned by the Journal’s parent company News Corp.
A doctor said security personnel entered Tehran’s Gandhi Hospital and forced patients to make room for their injured.
Iranian officials condemned the attacks as attacks on civilian targets, and Iranian state media published photographs of the aftermath but did not mention the presence of security forces.
The Israeli military said it attacked an intelligence ministry command center operating from an Iranian electricity company complex in the center of Tehran. Iranian state media said that several workers and engineers were killed in the attack, and several spectators were injured and killed.
Israel’s assessment said the attacks hurt civilian morale and caused some security forces to sleep in their vehicles, mosques or other sports facilities.
Meanwhile, Israeli intelligence officers began calling individual commanders and threatening them by name if they did not isolate in the event of an uprising, according to people familiar with the matter.
The Journal reviewed the contents of a call between a senior Iranian police commander and an agent of Israel’s foreign-intelligence service Mossad.
“Can you hear me?” A Mossad agent can be heard speaking in Persian. “We know everything about you. You are on our blacklist, and we have all the information about you.”
“Okay,” the commander said in the recording.
The Mossad agent said, “I called to warn you in advance that you must stand up for your people.” “And if you don’t, your fate will be as your leader. Do you hear me?”
“Brother, I swear on the Quran, I am not your enemy,” said the commander. “I’m already a dead man. Please, please come help us.”
On the ground, Israel went after police warehouses and destroyed computer equipment, vehicles and police gear, according to target lists seen by the Journal. Another target were motorcycle units, which have been at the center of efforts to suppress the protests.
At one time, Israel struck about 34 separate sites belonging to internal-security forces in Ilam province, an area of western Iran near the Iraqi border with a large Kurdish population, according to a target list seen by the Journal.
Iranian Kurds have strained relations with the central government they have their own armed groups. President Trump expressed support for an armed Kurdish offensive against Iran at the time of the attacks, but later turned around.
Last week, while Israeli officials were openly questioning whether air power alone could topple the regime, the military was expanding its targets.
Israel’s Air Force began operating fleets of drones hovering over Tehran and other areas of Iran, shifting its focus from command centers to individual Basij checkpoints and roadblocks. Drones attacked dozens of targets, killing two to four security personnel at a time.
Israeli security officials said that the attacks were in many cases guided by tips sent by ordinary Iranians. On Thursday, at least three separate checkpoints were targeted, including on the Imam Reza Highway and Martyrs Street in northern Tehran.
More followed over the weekend. On Sunday night, Israeli forces launched a targeted hunt for checkpoints, hitting 11, including Enghelab and Azadi Square in Tehran and several expressways.
The Iranians confirmed that the posts were under attack.
The success of the Israeli campaign is difficult to assess independently. Iran has shut down the Internet and closely controls information. People who shared videos of the damage have been arrested.
Israel has assessed that the air war is disrupting command and control and damaging the morale of security forces. Iranians said they have seen security forces struggling to secure workplaces as Israeli jets and drones take over schools and sports facilities and civilian buildings.
A Tehran doctor said police in Vanak, an affluent area of the capital, moved their post under a highway bridge to avoid being targeted. He said other forces requested him to be allowed to stay the night in their building. Many people were sleeping in a corner near the stairs. He said he also saw security forces setting up tents or building houses inside buses.
Other residents said that several security officers were hiding in residential buildings. When they go inside, neighbors leave for fear of a strike, a resident said.
Some said investigations into crimes such as theft that occurred before the war were being held back by attacks on police forces.
A resident of Tehran said that a friend of his has not been able to get back a car that was stolen before the start of the war and recovered by the police, because there is no one at the police station to hand it over to him. Another said police asked him and other shop owners to close shop before dark because they could not guarantee their safety.
Whatever the chaos in power, it is clear that Iran’s security forces still control the streets putting aside disagreements There were threats of being shot to death. Many Iranians said it would be suicidal to stand down now and feared Israel and the US would retain the regime but leave in anger.
Israel’s security establishment believes that Iran’s collapsing economy and popular anger have put the regime on an irreversible path to collapse, whether in war or on the street. However, ultimately, it is the job of Israel and America putting on the iranian people.
“They are seeing a system in ruins before their eyes,” Nadimi said. “But it will take a lot more attacks to turn the tide.”
Write to Dove Lieber dov.lieber@wsj.comon Benoit Faucon benoit.faucon@wsj.com And on Shayndy Rice Shayndi.Raice@wsj.com
