Former Prime Minister of Israel publicly admitted that he had secretly smuggled tens of thousands of SpaceX Starlink devices to Iran with the intention of overthrowing the regime.

Israeli opposition leader and former Prime Minister Naftali Bennett publicly acknowledged on June 23 that during his term in office from 2021 to 2022, his administration purchased tens of thousands of SpaceX Starlink satellite receivers and secretly smuggled them into Iran to support anti-government protesters in their bid to overthrow the Iranian regime. Bennett noted that the current Netanyahu government has failed to sustain the initiative, marking the first time an Israeli official has publicly confirmed such operations. Iran has repeatedly accused Israel and the U.S. of smuggling satellite equipment into the country to undermine its national security. Starlink has not obtained operational approval in Iran, though Elon Musk previously stated the service was already available in the country. The report also revealed a broader landscape of Israel’s intelligence operations against Iran. The Mossad has long used technical means to hack into surveillance and traffic cameras in Iran, combining AI technology and satellite imagery to build intelligence profiles. In the April 2026 Hezbollah pager bombings, the Mossad pre-planted miniature explosives in thousands of devices in advance, killing and wounding multiple mid-ranking commanders. That same month, a large number of U.S.-made core communication devices in Iran suffered a mass outage, forcing the authorities to frequently implement international network isolation. Politically, Israel’s next general election is scheduled for no later than October this year. Netanyahu’s approval rating has fallen from 40.5% in early March to 29.4%. Bennett stated that if he returns to power, he will work to overthrow the Iranian regime through measures including economic sabotage and industrial disruption.