Iran jails 2 for spying for Israel, including British dual national
Anousheh Ashouri and Ali Johari sentenced to 10 years for espionage, judiciary spokesman says
Iran has sentenced two people, including a British dual national, to 10 years behind bars after convicting them of spying for Israel, the judiciary said on Tuesday.
The claim comes amid reports of a wave of Israeli strikes against Iranian targets and Iran-backed militias in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon, and Israeli accusations that Iran had planned a kamikaze drone assault on northern towns.
Anousheh Ashouri, a woman with British and Iranian citizenship, was found guilty of feeding information to Israel’s Mossad spy agency and handed 10 years in jail, Iran’s judiciary spokesman Gholamhossein Esmaili said.
Ashouri had managed to “transmit a lot of information” to Israel, Esmaili said.
Her sentence included the return of millions of euros she allegedly received from the Mossad.
Ali Johari, an Iranian national, also got 10 years for various espionage offenses, including “widespread connections with Mossad… and meeting with various elements linked to the Zionists,” Esmaili said, as quoted by the judiciary’s website.
Johari was connected to the Mossad “for many years,” he said, and had met its agents in Sri Lanka, Thailand, Macao and elsewhere.
He had even visited Israel, he added.
There was no immediate comment from Israel on the sentences.
Tensions have shot up in recent days after Israel carried out airstrikes on Iranian and Iran-backed fighters in Syria to thwart what it said was a plot to fly explosives-laden drones into the country.
Jerusalem has also been blamed for airstrikes in Lebanon and Iraq, and Hezbollah terror chief Hassan Nasrallah gave a fiery speech Sunday in which he vowed revenge for the deaths of two of the group’s members.
Lebanese President Michel Aoun and a powerful Iraqi paramilitary force on Monday both said the respective strikes on their countries were a “declaration of war” by Israel.
Soldiers in northern Israel have been put on high alert over fears of a reprisal attack from Hezbollah or Iran following the airstrikes.
The Times of Israel Community.