Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu revealed Sunday that Israel moved up its pager operation against Hezbollah by several weeks after intelligence indicated that three pagers sent from Lebanon were being scanned in Iran. Speaking at the Jewish News Syndicate (JNS) conference in Jerusalem, Netanyahu said, “In the third week of September, we learned that Hezbollah had sent three pagers to Iran for scanning. I was told it would take them a day. I said: we need to act.” The operation, originally planned for October, was expedited. “We launched the campaign in Lebanon three weeks earlier than planned, while the military still needed time to prepare for war,” he said. “I told them to prepare for war immediately.” Netanyahu said Israel faced several options: wait and see what would happen with the pagers, attempt a broader assault or combine approaches. He mocked a proposal, which he dubbed "conquering Bulgaria," referring to an alleged suggestion from the IDF to seize Beirut and take over Lebanon. Instead, Netanyahu said, he chose a fourth option: “target the ballistic missile stockpile that [Hezbollah leader Hassan] Nasrallah built over years inside private homes.” He added that Israel also targeted an explosive scanner Iran had intended to send to Lebanon to examine the pagers. “We bombed the scanner,” Netanyahu said. “That’s how we confirmed they were sending the pagers to Iran for inspection.” To avoid civilian casualties, Netanyahu said, Israel hijacked Lebanese television broadcasts to warn residents before striking. “Within six to seven hours, we destroyed most of the weapons Nasrallah had stockpiled over 30 years,” he said. “Nasrallah counted on us not attacking homes — and he was right. But we did attack.” Netanyahu also revealed that immediately after his speech at the UN, his military secretary handed him a note reading “executed,” confirming the operation’s success. “Eliminating Nasrallah broke the axis,” he said, noting that “some people are irreplaceable — and so far, he has no replacement.” Get the Ynetnews app on your smartphone: Google Play: https://bit.ly/4eJ37pE | Apple App Store: https://bit.ly/3ZL7iNv Netanyahu added that he had considered notifying the Americans beforehand but ultimately decided against it. “[Former defense minister] Yoav Gallant and [former IDF chief of staff] Herzi Halevi were relieved when they realized I wasn’t going to,” he said sarcastically. Netanyahu also disclosed that Israeli F-16 fighter jets were deployed to intercept Iranian aircraft en route to Damascus to prevent the collapse of Bashar Assad’s regime. “Without our help, Assad’s regime wouldn’t have fallen,” he said, adding that Israel destroyed 90% of the Iranian weaponry transferred to Syria to ensure Assad’s survival. Turning to Iran’s nuclear program amid ongoing Washington-Tehran negotiations, Netanyahu insisted the only way to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons was a complete dismantling of its enrichment infrastructure, similar to the Libyan model. “There are ways to achieve this: a deal that neutralizes their nuclear infrastructure,” he said. Netanyahu noted that Israeli operations had delayed Iran’s progress toward a nuclear bomb by about a decade but had not halted it entirely. He warned that Iran had made significant advances in uranium enrichment and weaponization. “It’s not enough to prevent enrichment — they must lose the capability altogether,” he said, stressing the need to destroy centrifuges and remove enriched uranium from Iranian territory. Any agreement allowing Iran to resume enrichment later would, he warned, “lead to the opposite result.” He stressed, “One way or another, Iran will not have nuclear weapons.” The prime minister also attacked the Palestinian Authority (PA), equating it with Hamas. “Hamas says: we’ll destroy them militarily now. The PA says: we’ll push them back to the 1967 lines and then conquer them militarily,” Netanyahu said. “There’s no difference in approach between the Palestinian national movement before and after Israel’s founding.” He rejected the idea of establishing a Palestinian state, calling it “nonsense.” Referring to Gaza, he said, “We tried that already.” Netanyahu added that after Hamas is defeated, Israel would not allow the PA to take control of Gaza. “Hamas won’t be there. But we’re not putting the PA there either,” he said. “Why replace one regime sworn to destroy us with another regime sworn to destroy us?” He added Israel would continue to maintain military control over Gaza after the fighting ends. Netanyahu reiterated Israel’s commitment to returning all hostages and said the war’s goals were “the elimination of Hamas and the return of the captives.” Netanyahu also addressed what he called the “domestic front” — hidden power structures he said threaten Israeli democracy. “We have another front: the deep state,” he said. “Very deep, like the ocean. It threatens democracy and prevents citizens from forming governments that act on their behalf.” He did not specify which institutions he was referring to. Earlier Sunday, Netanyahu met with a delegation of dozens of UN ambassadors at his Jerusalem office, accompanied by Israeli Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon. According to Netanyahu’s office, the ambassadors, who came from Europe, Asia, Africa and Latin America, heard an in-depth briefing from Netanyahu about Israel’s fight on the international stage, its military campaign in Gaza, the efforts to free hostages and the battle against antisemitism. Follow Ynetnews on Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | Telegram