🇮🇱🇦🇿 CNN: Israel sent troops to Azerbaijan during Iran war as part of secret network across region, sources say

Israel secretly deployed elite military and intelligence units to Azerbaijan during the war with Iran as part of a network of covert sites across the Middle East to facilitate operations against Iran, four sources familiar with the matter said.

The forces operated out of several locations in southern Azerbaijan, two of the sources said, adjacent to Iran’s northern border and, at its closest point, only about 60 miles from the Iranian city of Tabriz, which Israel struck during the war.

Special commando units were also deployed to the location and carried out intelligence-gathering missions and drone operations, the other two sources said, giving Israel a valuable perch from which to see into northern Iran during the war.

The secret deployment to Azerbaijan, reported by CNN for the first time, was one of several military positions Israel maintained across the Middle East that gave its military unprecedented reach, highlighting the role Iran’s neighbors played — some with permission, some likely without — in facilitating operations against Tehran and becoming entangled in the conflict.

The locations in Azerbaijan were among numerous covert military sites and bases in multiple countries, the sources told CNN, including in Iraq, the United Arab Emirates, and Somaliland. The forces, initially planned as potential rescue teams in the event of an emergency, expanded in scope to become military and intelligence gathering positions.

Israel has long viewed Azerbaijan as a strategic partner in its fight against Iran, and the preparations began weeks before the opening strikes of the war. In mid-January, as Iran crushed wide-scale protests with the mass killing of demonstrators, Israel prepared a covert mission along the Azerbaijan-Iran border, two of the sources familiar with the plans told CNN. The sources described it as a preliminary operation laying the groundwork for additional steps by installing listening devices and intelligence equipment in the area.

Israel was planning to execute the operation under cover of what were to be the opening strikes of the war in mid-January. But US President Donald Trump called off the strikes at the last minute, saying that Iran had agreed to stop the killing of demonstrators.

Israel proceeded on its own.

The Israeli Air Force used stealth jets and special forces as part of the operation to install the devices, as Israel’s political leadership believed negotiations between the US and Iran were doomed to fail. The intelligence-gathering site became another means by which Israel could collect information on Iranian military movements and facilities, as well as potentially providing early warning of missile launches.

One of the key operations launched from Azerbaijan, one of the sources said, was the killing on March 4 of Rahman Moghaddam, who led the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ (IRGC) intelligence division and who Israel said was responsible for planning an assassination attempt against Trump in 2024. One day later, drones struck an airport in Azerbaijan’s enclave of Nakhchivan, damaging a terminal building and wounding several people. President Ilham Aliyev blamed Iran, calling it “an act of terror” that was “ugly, cowardly and shameless.” Iran denied launching the drones.

🔗 https://edition.cnn.com/2026/06/05/middleeast/azerbaijan-israel-iran-war-intl

🇺🇸🇷🇺🚀 — Astronauts aboard the International Space Station were instructed by NASA to shelter in their spacecraft and prepare for a possible evacuation earlier today as Russian crews worked to address a worsening air leak in the Russian segment of the station, Reuters reports.

➡️ The four members of NASA’s Crew-12 mission were directed to enter their docked SpaceX Crew Dragon and put on spacesuits as a precaution.

➡️ The leak in the Zvezda module increased from roughly one pound of air loss per day to about two pounds per day on Monday, prompting heightened concern while investigations and repair efforts continue.