For twelve nights in mid-June, Iran hurled more than 1,500 drones, cruise missiles and ballistic rockets at Israel. Arrow-3 batteries and U.S. Aegis ships grabbed the headlines, but raw intercept data tell only half the story. A significant share of Iranian projectiles never made it to Israeli airspace: they veered off course, spiralled, or detonated seconds after launch. Intelligence sources on both sides now point to an invisible saboteur embedded deep inside Iran’s supply chain.
A fingerprint in the circuit board
Independent tear-downs of recovered Shahed-136 drones show Western-made micro-controllers (NXP), RF transceivers (Analog Devices) and Texas Instruments power chips—components traced to brokers in the UAE, Hong Kong and Malaysia. Mossad operatives could have intercepted selected batches in transit, adding micro-explosives or kill-code before the parts reached IRGC assembly lines.
Israeli radar logs list roughly 520 ballistic-missile launches; only 430 ever entered the interceptor envelope. Dozens of Fateh-110 and Kheibar Shekan rounds broke apart during boost, a malfunction Israeli officials quietly attribute to “compromised IMUs.” By day seven, IRGC crews were cannibalising older liquid-fuel Shahab-3 stocks—then calling Washington to explore a truce.
The ceasefire miracle
U.S. mediation gained momentum just as Iran’s pre-rigged arsenal began to run dry. Tehran’s abrupt shift toward a ceasefire surprised regional diplomats—until Iranian security services announced the arrest of alleged “Mossad hardware cells” and displayed crates of tampered electronics.
The message was clear: Iran had realized much of its missile stockpile had been compromised, but couldn’t be sure how deep the sabotage ran. Israeli intelligence likely knew they were nearing the end of the pre-infiltrated batch—meaning the next wave might include clean, operational missiles.
A ceasefire, for both sides, came at the last possible moment, and most likely saved Israel from major hits.
Why the sabotage worked
- Volume manufacturing: Iran’s solid-fuel Fateh line imports ammonium perchlorate and off-the-shelf electronics in bulk, giving saboteurs repeat access points.
- Opaque brokers: third-country traders mask end-users, letting altered chips slip past export-control checks.
- No redundancy: budget drones like the Shahed-136 rely on single-point-of-failure flight-controllers—perfect Trojan-horse real estate.
What’s next
- Tehran is vetting all remaining missiles with X-ray scanners, slowing rearmament.
- Western regulators are drafting tighter end-use checks on mixed-signal ICs.
- Mossad has neither confirmed nor denied the operation, but Israeli officials now credit “cyber-penetration” for up to a third of all failed Iranian launches.
The Sudan Times concludes: had the Ayatollahs held their nerve and pressed on, they may have broken through. The sabotaged stockpile was running out, yes—but so were Israel’s interceptors, its political cover, and its margin for error. Another 72 hours of sustained fire might have overwhelmed the dome and left real scars on Tel Aviv.
Instead, Tehran blinked first.
Israel, for its part, ran the board in the opening moves—controlling tempo, timing, and escalation. But as the days dragged on, its limits became visible. It launched smart, hit hard, and revealed Mossad’s long arm inside Iranian silos—but it couldn’t deliver a decisive blow.
When the dust settled, one thing was clear: Israel may have the tools, but it is no United States. Not yet. Not in this kind of war.
