66 No. 76 JUSTICE As detailed below, throughout the Operation Israel directed its attacks solely against military objectives in Iran, including the Iranian regime’s nuclear weapons program, the ballistic missiles program, command and control centers, key members of the Iranian armed forces, and other persons who took a direct part in the hostilities. Israel did not direct any attacks against the Iranian civilian population. As repeatedly stated publicly by Israel’s political and military leadership, including the Prime Minister on June 13, 2025: ‘This is a war against the regime in Tehran, not against the Iranian people.’2 a. The imminent threat posed by recent critical developments in Iran’s nuclear program Since 2003, when the Iranian regime temporarily paused the advancement of its previous clandestine project to develop nuclear weapons (the AMAD project), the regime still persisted to enrich uranium to grades exceeding civilian-use level. During this period, Iran also secretly continued to take the steps necessary, and to invest the substantial resources required, to retain key capabilities and components of the AMAD project intact. The regime disguised these efforts under a newly-established body in the Iranian Ministry of Defense called the Organization of Defensive Innovation and Research (also known as SPND), as well as through other governmental bodies. In recent years and months, the regime had significantly accelerated different components of its nuclear weapons program, to a point where it was on the verge of obtaining nuclear weapons. Since 2021, the Iranian regime had enriched uranium to levels, and in quantities, far beyond plausible civilian-use levels, reaching 60% purity, a threshold widely recognized as a critical technical threshold towards weapons-grade uranium (90%).3 Iran’s enrichment yielded a stockpile capable of fueling several nuclear warheads, approximately half of which was accumulated in the six months prior to the Operation,4 making Iran the only non-nuclear-weapon State enriching uranium to this level, in clear defiance of peaceful use norms. Having nearly achieved military-grade enrichment – with less than one percent of the enrichment effort remaining – the regime was only days away from accumulating enough fissile material for a functional nuclear arsenal. This assessment was also bolstered by concomitant public communications of the International Atomic Energy Agency (‘IAEA’). On June 9, 2025, the IAEA flagged the rapid growth of enriched uranium stockpiles as a serious proliferation concern.5 On June 12, 2025, the IAEA Board of Governors adopted a decision noting that Iran had failed to cooperate fully with the IAEA, undermined the IAEA’s ability to do its work by withdrawing designations of inspectors, sanitized locations where activities took place, used undeclared nuclear material in different sites in Iran, and conducted activities with potential proliferation implications. The decision affirms that ‘Iran’s many failures to uphold its obligations since 2019 … constitutes non-compliance with its obligations under its Safeguards Agreement with the Agency’; and ‘the Agency is not able to verify that there has been no diversion of nuclear material required to be safeguarded under the Agreement to nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices’ towards non-peaceful purposes.6 Forces (IDF) (June 13, 2025), https://www.idf.il/en/mini-sites/israel-at-war/briefings-by-idf-spokesperson-bg-effiedefrin/june-25-press-briefings/press-briefing-by-idf-spokesperson-bg-effie-defrin-june-13-2025/. 2. Statement by Prime Minister Netanyahu, Prime Minister’s Office (Israel) (PMO) (June 13, 2025, updated June 15, 2025), https://www.gov.il/en/pages/statement130625. 3. Statement by Ambassador Daniel Meron at the Plenary Conference on Disarmament, Embassy of Israel (Geneva) (June 17, 2025), https://new.embassies.gov.il/ungeneva/en/news/statement-ambassador-daniel-meron-plenary-conferencedisarmament17-june-2025. 4. Information on the Iranian Nuclear Project, IDF (June 13, 2025), https://www.idf.il/en/mini-sites/idf-press-releasesisrael-at-war/june-25-pr/information-on-the-iranian-nuclear-project/. 5. Rafael M. Grossi, Director General, Introductory Statement to the Board of Governors, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) (June 9, 2025), https://www.iaea.org/newscenter/statements/iaea-director-generals-introductorystatement-to-the-board-of-governors-9-june-2025. 6. See, for example, IAEA, GOV/2025/38: NPT Safeguards Agreement with the Islamic Republic of Iran (Board of Governors resolution, adopted June 12, 2025), https://www.iaea.org/sites/default/files/25/06/gov2025-38.pdf; Statement by Ambassador Daniel Meron at the Plenary Conference on Disarmament, Embassy of Israel (Geneva) (June 17, 2025), https://new. embassies.gov.il/ungeneva/en/news/statement-ambassador-daniel-meron-plenary-conference-disarmament17-june-2025.
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