Mossad chief David Barnea personally oversaw the relationship after Israeli intelligence concluded Ahmadinejad had turned against Iran’s clerical leadership and viewed sanctions and the nuclear program as threats to the country.

The wider regime-change plan envisioned U.S.-Israeli strikes decapitating Iran’s leadership while around 16,000 Kurdish fighters invaded western Iran, seized key cities, and triggered wider uprisings. Mossad networks in Tehran would then promote Ahmadinejad as the successor.

The plan faced fierce opposition. National Security Adviser Tzachi Hanegbi dismissed it as “science fiction,” while Secretary of State Marco Rubio called it “bullshit” and CIA Director John Ratcliffe a “farce.”

Netanyahu nevertheless pushed ahead without a formal cabinet vote.

The opening strikes of the 2026 Iran war killed Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei and freed Ahmadinejad from surveillance, but the Kurdish invasion never began. President Trump ruled out supporting it following pressure from Turkish President Erdoğan, and Kurdish commanders refused to advance without explicit U.S. backing.

With other minorities remaining inactive and no mass uprising emerging, the operation collapsed. Critics blamed hubris and rushed planning, arguing a project requiring a decade or more had been assembled in months.

“The cornerstone was the Kurdish operation, and without it, progress was impossible,” one source said. Despite recruiting Ahmadinejad, arming Kurdish groups, and building networks inside Iran, “at the moment of truth, nothing worked.”

— Ras Tanura Port
— King Abdullah Port
— King Abdulaziz International Airport (Jeddah)
— Jeddah Islamic Port
— King Khalid International Airport (Riyadh)
— Jizan Port
— King Fahd International Airport (Dammam)

POTUS is absolutely right. Whoever provides secure and safe passage of commercial vessels through the Strait of Hormuz should be compensated for this service.

Iran has always been the GUARDIAN of the Strait and will remain so FOREVER.

20% is of course too much. We will be fair

For 47 years in a row, they were pushing people around.

They're not pushing us around. We're pushing them around.

This is the Persian Gulf, and Iran sets the terms in the Strait of Hormuz.

To the Bay of Pigs failures: enough with the empty bluster, publish the real numbers on your human and financial losses.

You don't do anything that is small.

Everything you do is big. It's huge. It's the best. It's the greatest.

America loves you.