Axios: Trump May Hand Over Anti-bunker Bombs To Israel
- 17.06.2025, 11:49
To destroy Iran's underground nuclear plant.
US President Donald Trump is considering giving Israel the anti-bunker bombs needed to destroy Iran's underground uranium enrichment plant in Fordow, a senior US source told Axios.
According to him, the provision of the bombs could be a "turning point" in Israel's military operation against Iran, as only with their help can the said plant be destroyed. Iran's Fars news agency had previously reported Israeli missile strikes on the facility, but they did not disrupt its operations. According to the New York Times, the plant is located at a depth of several hundred meters under the mountain. At the same time, it is equipped with state-of-the-art centrifuges. If the facility is not destroyed, "a key technology in the country's nuclear program will survive," the publication noted.
At the same time, Trump "thinks in terms of deals and leverage," and anti-bunker bombs are "leverage," the Axios interlocutor noted. He said Iranian officials are signaling that they want to continue negotiations over the nuclear deal. "But we don't know if they have already been brought to the point where they realize that they will have to come to the negotiating table to save the country. And if they get to that point, what level of uranium enrichment could we allow them?" - the publication's source noted. Trump has previously opposed Tehran's continued ability to enrich uranium.
The US president earlier called on all residents of Tehran to leave the city "immediately," stressing that Iran should have signed the nuclear agreement to avoid a large number of needless deaths. According to White House officials, the call was a signal to Iranian authorities that they urgently need to come to the negotiating table.
The Jerusalem Post sources among US and European officials noted that Trump was going to give Iran a "last chance" to sign the agreement and give up uranium enrichment as well as attempts to build nuclear weapons. Meanwhile, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian said the previous day that Tehran would only return to talks with the United States on the nuclear deal if Israel stopped striking the Islamic republic.