Arabic media: Israeli cyberattack struck Natanz nuclear facility

The Kuwaiti paper argues that Iran has now lost 80% of its stock of this gas.

By SETH J. FRANTZMAN
View of a damage building after a fire broke out at Iran's Natanz Nuclear Facility, in Isfahan, Iran, July 2, 2020. (photo credit: REUTERS)
View of a damage building after a fire broke out at Iran's Natanz Nuclear Facility, in Isfahan, Iran, July 2, 2020.
(photo credit: REUTERS)
Kuwait’s Al-Jarida newspaper, which covers security incidents and sometimes alleges Israeli involvement, says that Israel carried out a cyber attack on the Natanz nuclear facility on Thursday. The incident has been downplayed by Iran but experts say that a sensitive warehouse that deals with centrifuges was damaged.
According to the report a source informed Al-Jarida that a cyber attack hit the facility. The report linked this to an earlier cyber attack on Israeli water infrastructure that Iran allegedly carried out and then another cyber attack on an Iranian port in May. It also links the Natanz cyber attack to the earlier Stuxnet computer worm attack in 2010.
These are coordinated sabotage operations, according to the newspaper. The Natanz incident explosion and another explosion near Parchin targeted UF6 gas storage that was used for uranium enrichment. This is uranium hexafluoride gas.
In November, 2019 Iran unveiled the production and injection of the gas into IR-6 centrifuges. These are the advanced centrifuges Iran has increased at Natanz. The Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI)’s Ali Akbar Salehi has spoken openly about the gas and the new centrifuges. Iran added around 30 of these IR-6 centrifuges to Natanz in November 2019, making at least 60 in total at the site.
The Kuwaiti paper argues that Iran has now lost 80% of its stock of this gas. “This is likely to be an electronic attack on the computer network that controls the storage compression tanks. Iran will need about two months to compensate for the gas that was lost.”
The Natanz explosion led to a “crack in the reactor building. Specialized groups went to the reactor to discover whether there was leakage in radioactive materials.” Iran says there was no leak at the site.