Iran Sent ‘Operational Trigger’ to Activate Sleeper Cells After Khamenei’s Death: Report

According to an encrypted message that was intercepted by Washington, Iran had issued a potential operational trigger, which was to activate the sleeper assets abroad when the military tussle between the United States and Israel started.

The United States and Israel have gone beyond a week of heavy airstrikes on Iran and Iran has persistently attacked Israel and the Gulf nations. Meanwhile, Israel also is also hitting Iran backed Hezbollah in Lebanon and the militant organisation is still firing rockets into Israel.

The intercepted encrypted message claimed that Iran might have issued a potential operation trigger to activate the existence of sleeper assets in other countries.

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The coded message was delivered following the demise of Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei on February 28. The report described the message as having instructions to covert operatives or sleeper assets and cited a federal alert being sent to the law enforcement agencies.

The warning was that the message may be meant to activate or give instructions to prepositioned sleeper forces which may be outside the country of origin.

The message sent through the switched transmission was encrypted and appeared to be sent to the so-called secret users, with whom the needed encryption key is shared. These kinds of messages are made to convey instructions to militant spies or sleeper cells without involving the use of the internet and mobile network.

The United States warning claimed that there was an intelligence agency that detected that a broadcasting station was receiving the message repeatedly several times to many other countries other than Iran.

“While the exact contents of these transmissions cannot currently be determined, the sudden appearance of a new station with international rebroadcast characteristics warrants heightened situational awareness,” the memo said.

The warning also indicated that there is no operational threat associated with a particular place. But it requested the law enforcers to increase the surveillance of suspicious radio-frequency signals.

US officials tighten security

It is worth noting that the counterintelligence officers have questioned the possibility of attacks of revenge within the United States due to the war against Iran.

Former assistant FBI director Chris Swecker was quoted in Fox News shortly after the war broke out saying that, this is now the time there will be a Hezbollah cell or a Hamas cell act in the United States as a violent entity.

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X he had directed that counterterrorism and intelligence teams be placed on high alert and deploy all the assisting security resources required.

In this week, US President Donald Trump responded to the question of whether Iran would attack the mainland of the United States, by saying.

“I guess ... We think about it all the time. We plan for it. But yeah, you know, we expect some things. Like I said, some people will die. When you go to war, some people will die.”

The mayor of major American cities like Los Angeles, Miami and New York have also stated that they will be reinforcing patrols around sensitive parts of their cities including places of worship, cultural centres and schools.

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