Iran's embassy in Bulgaria denied on Thursday Israeli accusations that Tehran was behind a bomb attack on an airport bus in the city of Burgas that killed five Israeli tourists.
"The
unfounded statements by different statesmen of the Zionist regime in
connection with the accusations against Iran about its possible
participation in the incident with the blown-up bus with Israeli
tourists in Burgas is a familiar method of the Zionist regime, with a
political aim, and is a sign of the weakness ... of the accusers," the
Islamic Republic's mission in Sofia said in a statement.
The attack
targeting Israelis killed at least seven people in the city of Burgas,
soon after a charter plane, Air Bulgaria flight 392 arrived from
Ben-Gurion Airport. The seven included five Israelis, the driver, and
the suicide bomber, the Foreign Ministry said.
A video taken from the CCTV surveillance camera shows the suspected bomber at the Burgas airport on the day of the attack. The footage shows the bomber was similar in appearance to tourists arriving at the airport.
Since the explosion, Israel's highest officials have accused Iran and
Hezbollah of perpetrating the attack, and vowed a powerful retaliation.
In unusually tough remarks, President Shimon Peres on Thursday said that Israel will hit terror nests
around world.
"We were
witnesses to a deadly terror attack coming out of Iran ... we know there
were other attempts, and this time they succeeded," the president
stated.
"It [Israel] has the means and the will to silence and paralyze terror organizations," Peres asserted.
Defense
Minister Ehud Barak said Thursday that Hezbollah was responsible for
the terror attack in Burgas under the auspices of Iran.
Echoing
his comments from Wednesday evening, Barak told Israel Radio that Israel
would do everything in its power to to find the perpetrators, and bring
them to justice.
In response to Bulgarian President Rosen Plevneliev's statement that Mossad did not warn Bulgaria of an expected attack,
Barak said that Israeli intelligence services transfer all information
of this nature that it receives. However, he said he did not think that
intelligence services had accurate information such as the information
it obtained in order to thwart the terror attacks in Cyprus and Thailand
earlier in the year.
Reinforcing Barak's comments, Foreign
Minister Avigdor Liberman told Israel Radio on Thursday that Israel has
solid information that Hezbollah, in close cooperation with the Iranian
Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) carried out the terror attack in
Burgas.
According to Liberman, Israel's information identifies
with certainty and beyond all doubt the Iranian fingerprint on the
attack, but did not specify further. Iran and Hezbollah have not stopped
operating against Israel for a moment, he added.
On Wednesday, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said Iran was likely behind the attack on Israeli civilians in Bulgaria, and vowed a powerful Israeli response.
"All
the signs lead to Iran. Only in the past few months we have seen
Iranian attempts to attack Israelis in Thailand, India, Georgia, Kenya,
Cyprus and other places," Netanyahu said in a statement.
"This is
an Iranian terror campaign that is spreading throughout the world,"
Netanyahu said. "Israel will react powerfully against Iranian terror,"
"Eighteen
years exactly after the blast at the Jewish community center in
Argentina, murderous Iranian terror continues to hit innocent people.
This is an Iranian terror attack that is spreading throughout the entire
world."
Opposition leader Shelly Yechimovich responded to the
"murderous terror attack" in Bulgaria on Wednesday, saying "there is no
doubt that the instability in the region is spawned by Iran aiming
especially for Israelis and Jews throughout the world."
"Israeli
security forces have succeeded to prevent several attempted attacks
targeted at traveling Israelis in recent months," Yechimovich added.
"Unfortunately, today in Bulgaria we were forced again to cope with
terror operations."
Herb Keinon contributed to this report.
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