During a barrage of airstrikes on the seventh day of the confrontation between the two nations, Israeli jets struck a nuclear reactor that was being built in central Iran.
The Israeli military claimed that it stopped the operation of the Arak heavy water reactor for “nuclear weapons development” by targeting the core seal.
The International Atomic Energy Agency verified that there was no radioactive material inside the damaged plant.
Nuclear bomb-grade plutonium can be found in spent fuel from heavy water reactors.
Iran, which maintains that its nuclear program is completely benign, agreed to repair and redesign Arak in order to prevent it from producing weapons-grade plutonium as part of a 2015 agreement with Western powers.
