The New York Times on Sunday expanded on a September 2025 exclusive by The Jerusalem Post regarding the ability of intelligence agencies to catch the Iranians with their remaining 60% enriched uranium if they tried to access it for use.
Previously, the Post reported that the Mossad had a sufficient handle on the location of Iran’s enriched uranium – not struck during June 2025’s Operation Rising Lion – and could intervene if Tehran appeared to be trying to use that uranium to move in the direction of a nuclear weapon.
Further, the Post noted that the Mossad would place a heavy focus on the issue until, at a minimum, the Islamic Republic granted the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) access to nuclear inspectors.
During the June 2025 operation, Israel and the US destroyed much of Iran’s three major nuclear facilities – Natanz, Fordow, and Isfahan. They also damaged dozens of other nuclear facilities.
However, a major dispute and source of speculation was the 60% enriched uranium – 400 kilograms worth of close-to-weapons-grade material – that was not destroyed by Israel and the US during Operation Rising Lion.
In theory, this volume of 60% enriched uranium could be further enriched and used to produce around half a dozen nuclear bombs.
Critics say Iran timeline to build nuclear weapon about two years
In late June 2025, some Israeli critics claimed that the Islamic Republic could even rush out a nuclear bomb in a matter of months, since the uranium had not been struck.
In contrast, several Israeli defense officials told the Post at the time that the soonest Iran could attempt to produce a nuclear weapon – if it tried now to rebuild all the different bombed pieces of its program needed to do so – would be in around two years.
This was because enriched uranium by itself was of little use.
But the revelation that the Mossad could intervene if Tehran tried to make any new, dangerous moves with the uranium was expected to give the ayatollahs pause.
One of the conditions the West imposed on Iran to avoid the return of global sanctions in late summer 2025 was for the Islamic Republic to give the IAEA access to its uranium. Tehran never did.
On Sunday, the NYT added that American intelligence agencies are also on the case.
According to the report, US intelligence has determined that Iran – or, potentially, another group – could retrieve Tehran’s primary store of highly enriched uranium, even though it was entombed under the country’s nuclear site at Isfahan by American and Israeli strikes last year.
Officials familiar with the intelligence noted that the Islamic Republic can now reach the uranium through a very narrow access point. It is unclear how quickly Iran could move the uranium, which is in gas form and stored in canisters.
US officials have said that American spy agencies have constant surveillance on the Isfahan site and a high degree of confidence that they would be able to detect and react to any attempt by the Iranian government or other groups to move it.
On Saturday, US President Donald Trump was asked on Air Force One if he would consider sending in ground forces to seize the uranium.
He responded, “Right now we’re just decimating them, but we haven’t gone after it. But [it is] something we could do later on. We wouldn’t do it now.”
The report said that Washington had decided not to try to retrieve the uranium last year because doing so would have been too dangerous.
US officials said in the report that the air campaign against Iran would need to continue for days to further weaken Iranian defenses before making any final decision on the viability of that type of raid.
The option to conduct a raid on nuclear sites was reported earlier by Semafor. The NYT reported in January that Trump was considering sending special forces teams into Iran.
On Saturday, the US president said that the current attacks on the Iranian regime would need to go on for much longer before even considering sending in special forces because “if we ever did that, they would be so decimated that they wouldn’t be able to fight at the ground level.”
Elbridge Colby, the Pentagon’s top policy official, was asked earlier this week how much government analysts were focused on the highly enriched uranium. He told a Council on Foreign Relations audience that, “without getting into any specifics, obviously we’re always highly focused on that,” the NYT reported.
The Institute for Science and International Security has published reports of Iranians adding dirt and rubble to the area or removing it, presumably related either to accessing the uranium or protecting the facility from anticipated new strikes from the US and Israel, after the new campaign began on February 28.
At present, Iran appears more focused on firing ballistic missiles than on nuclear activities, and Israel and the US are focused on the aerial campaign against the regime.
Nevertheless, all sides are likely to have contingency plans for the 60% enriched uranium, still assumed to be held underground.