A former Israeli prime minister claimed on Tuesday that Tel Aviv had smuggled Starlink internet receivers into Iran earlier this year to boost the protests against the Islamic regime.
At the JNS International Policy Summit in Jerusalem, Naftali Bennett, the prime minister from 2021 to 2022, told a gathering that he had started a "process of acquiring and smuggling into Iran tens of thousands of Starlink receptors that would allow continuity of the internet and social networks".
Elon Musk's SpaceX owns Starlink, which offers satellite internet connections. Iran has previously accused the US and Israel of importing the devices to compromise its security. Although Starlink does not have a license to operate in Iran, Musk has stated that the service is available there.
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According to Bennett, the gadgets were meant to help demonstrators organise and eventually overthrow the Iranian regime, as reported by Reuters.
"Unfortunately, the current incompetent Israeli government stopped doing that," Bennett said. "And when the protest happened, that infrastructure was not there."
Israel and other Middle Eastern nations must "join forces to repel and ultimately topple" Iran's leadership, according to Bennett, chairman of a right-wing party and one of several opposition lawmakers running to succeed Netanyahu in an election scheduled for October.
To cheers, he declared, "It's a rotten, old, disconnected, incompetent regime, and it will fall as the Soviet Union fell."
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Notably, Iran's Parliament has reveiwed a draft anti-espionage bill that would impose a penalty for using or owning unapproved satellite internet equipment.
The draft, which was released in October following the 12-day conflict between the US and Israel, stipulated that using Starlink or other unlicensed satellite internet services for personal use would result in prison sentences ranging from six months to two years, according to a report by Iran International.
Additionally, it established the death penalty for those determined to have acted against the state or engaged in espionage using such technologies.
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