Iran’s nuclear facilities were targeted in Operation Rising Lion in June, leaving them “obliterated” according to Yossi Cohen, former head of the Mossad.
Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian addresses the 80th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) at the U.N. headquarters in New York, U.S., September 24, 2025.(photo credit: REUTERS/JEENAH MOON)ByREUTERS, JERUSALEM POST STAFFTehran will rebuild its nuclear facilities “with greater power,” Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian told state media on Sunday, adding that the country does not seek a nuclear weapon.
US President Donald Trump has warned that he would order fresh attacks on Iran’s nuclear sites should Tehran try to restart facilities that the United States bombed in June.
Pezeshkian made his comments during a visit to the country’s Atomic Energy Organization, during which he met with senior managers from Iran’s nuclear industry.
n claims program for civilian purposes
“Destroying buildings and factories will not create a problem for us; we will rebuild and with greater strength,” the Iranian president told state media.
Tehran maintains that its nuclear program is for purely civilian purposes.
“It’s all intended for solving the problems of the people, for disease, for the health of the people,” Pezeshkian said in reference to Iran’s nuclear activities.
An Iranian missile system is displayed next to a banner with a picture of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei during Iranian Defence Week, in a street in Tehran, Iran, September 25, 2025. (credit: MAJID ASGARIPOUR/WANA)
Iran’s nuclear facilities were targeted in Operation Rising Lion in June, leaving them “obliterated” according to Yossi Cohen, former head of the Mossad. Cohen claimed that he knows with certainty that “Iran cannot enrich any more uranium these days.”
In June, US President Trump said at a press conference that all the enriched uranium Iran had was inside sites bombed during the operation, calling Iran’s nuclear program “completely and totally obliterated.” At the time, Trump said he was unsure if the US needed to make a deal with Iran at all due to the levels of destruction at the Iranian nuclear facilities.
‘Keep dreaming,’ Ayatollah tells Trump
However, in October, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei claimed that the US had not destroyed Iran’s nuclear industry, telling President Trump to “keep dreaming.“
Iran has recently scrapped a cooperation deal that it signed with the UN nuclear watchdog IAEA in September, its Supreme National Security Council Secretary announced on the same day, according to state media.
This announcement comes after the US announced its intentions to resume nuclear weapons testing on Thursday, with Iranian officials condemning the decision.
80% of Palestinian Arabs seek to oust PA Chairman Abbas, while a growing number want Hamas in charge.
Dalit Halevi
Published:
Hamas terroristsAbed Rahim Khatib/Flash90
A new opinion poll by the Ramallah-based Palestinian Center for Policy and Survey Research (PCPSR) has found a significant drop in support for Palestinian Authority Chairman Mahmoud Abbas.
According to the poll’s findings, 80% of Palestinian Arabs believe that Abbas should step down, with only 13% supporting the chairman.
77% of respondents said they believe that the PA should not be the one to control the Gaza Strip, but rather Hamas should.
Political analyst Mohsen Saleh noted that the poll results are not surprising, but rather reflect a consistent trend, especially during the last few years and after the October 7th Massacre, as six consecutive polls by the center have shown.
Speaking to the Palestinian Arab Quds Press, Saleh noted that Abbas’s declining status is due to his “monopoly on political decision-making and his sole control of power, through the disruption of Palestinian institutional work.”
He added that “Abbas responded to Israeli and American pressures by excluding resistance forces, especially Hamas, from political participation, and that the decrees he issued were designed to ensure results tailored to his own and the Fatah movement’s needs.”
Saleh also stated that the Palestinian leadership’s approach after the October 7th Massacre was negative, and it persecuted resistance operatives in Judea and Samaria in collaboration with Israel during the war. “The Palestinian street now sees resistance as the only response to this reality.”
Primary target of strike in Kfar Roummane is logistics chief in terror group’s Radwan Force, military says; Katz says Lebanese president ‘dragging his feet’ on disarming Hezbollah
A woman stops to look at the wreckage of a vehicle, a day after an Israeli airstrike that killed its occupants, in the southern Lebanese village of Kfar Roummane in the Nabatiyeh district, on November 2, 2025. (Mahmoud ZAYYAT / AFP)
Four members of Hezbollah’s elite Radwan Force were killed in an Israeli airstrike in southern Lebanon on Saturday night, the military said, with Lebanese authorities also confirming four dead in the attack.
The military said the primary target of the strike in Kfar Roummane, close to Nabatieh, was the logistics chief of the Radwan Force.
The military did not name the man, but said he was involved in transferring weapons and “attempts to restore terror infrastructure” in southern Lebanon.
Lebanon’s health ministry said that the strike “killed four persons and wounded three in a preliminary toll.”
The three other men killed in the strike were also members of the Radwan Force, the IDF said, adding that their activities constitute a violation of the ceasefire.
Lebanese media named the four as Jawad Jaber, Hadi Hamid, Abdullah Kahil, and Muhammad Kahil.
The Radwan Force was previously tasked with invading Israel in a future war, and the IDF said the elite unit had worked on the terror group’s “Conquer the Galilee” plan for years, until the 2023-2024 war saw most of Hezbollah’s leadership eliminated.
On Sunday, Defense Minister Israel Katz said that Lebanese President Joseph Aoun was stalling in efforts to disarm Hezbollah, and warned Israel would act if Beirut does not.
“Hezbollah is playing with fire and the Lebanese president is dragging his feet,” Katz said in a post on X after the IDF confirmed it carried out the strike in south Lebanon.
“The Lebanese government’s commitment to disarm Hezbollah and remove it from southern Lebanon must be realized,” Katz said, adding that “maximum enforcement will continue and deepen – we will not allow a threat to the residents of the [Israeli] north.”
Defense Minister Israel Katz at the graduation of an IDF officers’ course, October 30, 2025. (Noam Revkin Fenton/FLASH90)
Hezbollah began attacking Israel on October 8, 2023, a day after fellow Iran-backed terror group Hamas invaded southern Israel, sparking the war in Gaza. After nearly a year of cross-border fire, Israel launched an intensive campaign against the terror group in September 2024, massively degrading its forces and eliminating most of its top leadership. A ceasefire was declared in November of that year.
The ceasefire required both Israel and Hezbollah to vacate southern Lebanon, to be replaced by the Lebanese armed forces. Israel has withdrawn from all but five strategic posts along the border, and regularly strikes what it says are Hezbollah’s attempts to rearm.
Since the ceasefire, the IDF says it has killed over 330 Hezbollah operatives in strikes, hit hundreds of Hezbollah sites, and conducted over 1,000 raids and other small operations in southern Lebanon in response to violations by the terror group.
Weakened by the war and still facing regular Israeli strikes, Hezbollah is under internal and international pressure to hand over its weapons, and the Lebanese army has drawn up a plan to disarm it. However, the latter has reportedly expended so much ordnance to blow up Hezbollah stockpiles that it has run out of explosives. Hezbollah, which is backed by Iran, has vowed not to lay down its arms.
But despite those efforts, Israel reportedly believes Hezbollah has managed to amass some new weapons, raising the possibility of renewed conflict. Meanwhile, Lebanon claims that Israel rejected its overture to begin talks last month on an IDF withdrawal.
Agencies and Times of Israel staff contributed to this report.
