The Biden administration tried to warn Iran about terrorist attacks carried out by the Islamic State (ISIS) against the country in early January, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday.
ISIS operatives detonated two explosive belts in the city of Kerman on Jan. 3 and killed over 80 Iranians, many of whom were in attendance at the memorial service of former Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) commander Gen. Qassem Soleimani. The Biden administration privately tried to warn Iran about the plot in advance, providing detailed intelligence pointing to the time and location of the planned attacks, according to the WSJ. (RELATED: US Has ‘Indisputable’ Intel ISIS Carried Out Iran Bombings: REPORT)
The #IslamicState has claimed the #Kerman, #Iran suicide bombings pic.twitter.com/CoCwkOLGKT
— Lucas Webber (@LucasADWebber) January 4, 2024
“Prior to ISIS’s terrorist attack on January 3, 2024, in Kerman, Iran, the U.S. government provided Iran with a private warning that there was a terrorist threat within Iranian borders,” one U.S. official told the WSJ. “The U.S. government followed a longstanding ‘duty to warn’ policy that has been implemented across administrations to warn governments against potential lethal threats. We provide these warnings in part because we do not want to see innocent lives lost in terror attacks.”
Iran failed to act on the intelligence provided by the Biden administration, and the ISIS attacks were carried out against Kerman on Jan. 3. It is unclear why Iran did not listen to the warning or try to prevent the attack, U.S. officials told the WSJ.
It also isn’t clear which channels the Biden administration communicated this intelligence with Iran, nor whether this is the first time such a warning was issued to the country, according to the WSJ. The Biden administration tried to keep its communication with the Iranian regime under close secret, one U.S. official said.
The U.S.’s “duty to warn” obligates intelligence agencies to notify both domestic and international citizens if they are under threat of a terrorist attack, according to the Director of National Intelligence. Some exceptions exist, including if the targeted individual is themself a terrorist or other certain classes of criminal.
The Biden administration could have chosen to warn Iran to protect civilian life, or to sway Iran into not provoking further conflict in the Middle East, one U.S. official told the WSJ.
Iran is the world’s largest state sponsor of terror and is responsible for much of the ongoing chaos in the Middle East. Iran backs roughly a dozen Islamic terror and militia groups throughout the region including Hezbollah and Hamas, the latter of which killed 1,200 Israelis on Oct. 7.
Iran and ISIS are longstanding enemies; the Iranian regime views ISIS as a terrorist organization and seeks to eradicate it from the Middle East, while ISIS believes Iran’s Shiite promotes a lesser version of Islam and therefore must be killed.
Soleimani was assassinated in a U.S. airstrike in 2020 at the behest of former President Donald Trump, and is now viewed by the Iranian population as a martyr to be celebrated. Iran previously claimed that Hamas’ Oct. 7 attacks against Israel were revenge for Soleimani’s death, though that was disputed by others within the regime, according to Iran International.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
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