Early on May 23, nine people were wounded in an explosion at a chemical and fireworks factory in the city of Shahin Shahr in the central Iranian province of Isfahan, according to the Iranian media.
“The reason for the explosion at the Sepahan Nargostar chemical industry is under investigation while nine injured people have been transferred to hospital,” the Mehr News Agency quoted Abbas Abedi, a spokesman for Isfahan medical emergency center, as saying.
According to the Islamic Republic News Agency, the factory produces industrial and commercial explosive materials, including fireworks and gunpowder, as well as chemicals like nitrate, sodium, potassium, strontium, calcium, copper and barium. The factory operates under the supervision of the National Security Council.
Amichai Stein, a correspondent of Israeli Public Broadcasting Corporation, claimed that Iran was manufacturing drones at the facility.
#BREAKING: A factory that makes Iranian drones has suffered a major explosion days after Israel has downed an armed Iranian drone that crossed into Israel – @patrickwintour scoop
— Amichai Stein (@AmichaiStein1) May 23, 2021
The journalist linked the explosion to a recent incident, in which the Israeli military shot down an armed drone near the city of Beit She’an. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has recently claimed that the drone was launched by Iranian forces toward Israel from either Syria or Iraq.
“Iran sent an armed drone to Israel from Iraq or Syria. Iranian forces launched the armed drone, which our forces intercepted on the border between Israel and Jordan,” Netanyahu said at a press conference alongside German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas on May 20.
Stein claims suggest that the explosion at the Sepahan Nargostar factory may have been the result of a sabotage act by the Israeli intelligence. Last month, an act of sabotage targeted Iran’s uranium enrichment facility in Natanz. Israel was blamed.