The U.S. State Department denied on Tuesday that it received forewarning from Iran about the Islamic Republic’s ballistic missile attack on Israel earlier that day.
Reuters reported after the attack that a “senior Iranian official” said that Iran alerted Washington “shortly before the attacks” via “diplomatic channels.”
Matthew Miller, the State Department spokesman, said at a press briefing on Tuesday that the report wasn’t true.
“That is absolutely false,” Miller said. “We had no kind of warning from the government of Iran that they were going to launch such an attack.”
“This is not the first time that Iran has said things about supposed interactions with the U.S. government—messages it has sent to the US government that have not been true,” Miller added. “They have done that a number of times over the last few months.”
Iran’s foreign minister claimed after Iran’s ballistic missile attack in April that he had given the United States a 72-hour advanced warning ahead of that ballistic missile and drone attack on Israel. The White House denied receiving such a warning.
Miller said that Washington’s warning that an Iranian ballistic missile attack on Israel was “imminent” in the hours before Iran launched the missiles was based on other information and not from direct or indirect conversations with Iran.
He added that the United States has the ability to send messages to Iran—despite the absence of an Iranian embassy in Washington—and warned it against launching this attack.
“Without speaking to any messages in particular, we have made clear the position of the United States that Iran should not launch this attack—that it would be a mistake for Iran to launch this attack,” Miller said.
He added that as of the press conference, Washington hadn’t received any diplomatic note from Iran about the attacks.