The drone attack on a defense facility in the Iranian city of Isfahan was carried out by Israel to protect its own security interests, and not to prevent weapons exports to Russia, according to a New York Times report on Sunday.

Iran has yet to deliver missiles to Russia despite reports since October that it plans to do so, but Tehran has been supplying Shahed-136 suicide drones for the Kremlin’s use in the nearly year-long invasion of Ukraine.

Former prime minister Naftali Bennett said in an upcoming YouTube video shared with The New York Times that he decided to “create a price tag” and increase activities inside Iran following Tehran’s attempts “to murder Israelis in Cyprus, in Turkey ” in 2022.

“This cowardly act was carried out today as part of the efforts made by enemies of the Iranian nation in recent months to make the Islamic Republic insecure,” Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian said Sunday at a press conference.

The Biden administration has also signaled that it had abandoned the possibility of reviving a deal with Iran over its nuclear program, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, which then-US president Donald Trump withdrew from in 2018.

Trump then instituted a “maximum pressure” sanctions regime, targeting various Iranian sectors, leading Tehran to respond by expanding its nuclear program in violation of the JCPOA.