U.S. tells Iran it “had no involvement” in Israeli strike: Axios

 The U.S. told Iran that it "had no involvement" or advanced knowledge of an Israeli strike on a diplomatic compound in Syria that killed a senior Iranian general, Axios reports citing a U.S. official.

A National Security Council spokesperson told Axios that the U.S. "had no involvement in the [Israeli] strike and we did not know about it ahead of time."

A senior U.S. official said the U.S. “has communicated this directly to Iran,” the report adds.

Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps said that 7 military advisers, including Generals Mohammad Reza Zahedi and Mohammad Hadi Haj Rahimi and five of their companions were killed in the Israeli missile attack on the Consulate of the Islamic Republic of Iran in Damascus.

General Mohammad Reza Zahedi is the most senior IRGC officer to be killed since the U.S. assassinated Qassem Soleimani in 2020.

According to Axios, Israeli intelligence has been following Zahedi, who was “in charge of arming and coordinating with Hezbollah and other pro-Iranian militias in Lebanon and Syria”, for a long time.

The report adds that according to Israeli and U.S. officials Israel notified the Biden administration a few minutes before its air force conducted the strike but didn't ask for a U.S. green light.

A U.S. official said the Israeli heads-up wasn't detailed and arrived when the military jets were already in the air.