Israel's attack on Iran was years in the making. How did they get here?

TEL AVIV, Israel (AP) — Israel’s massive strike on Iran on Friday morning came after decades of mutual hostility and a long-running shadow war of covert strikes and sabotage.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has long identified Iran as its greatest threat, citing the country’s nuclear program, its hostile rhetoric and support for anti-Israel militant groups across the region. Iran has championed the Palestinian cause and portrayed Israel as a malicious Western encroachment on the Middle East.

The latest escalation was set in motion by Hamas' Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, which sparked a crushing Israeli response and eventually drew in Iran's other allies, who were in turn crippled by successive waves of Israeli strikes, leaving Iran largely alone in facing Friday's onslaught.

Here’s a closer look:

Following Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, the country’s leadership immediately identified the U.S., Britain and Israel as its main enemies because of their ties to Iran's deposed monarch and the long history of Western colonialism and military interventions in the Middle East.

Over the past two decades, Israel has repeatedly accused Iran of seeking nuclear weapons and is believed to have carried out numerous covert attacks on its nuclear program, including cyberattacks and the killing of Iranian nuclear scientists — while rarely acknowledging such operations.

Iran insists its nuclear program is entirely peaceful, but the U.N. atomic watchdog agency has warned that Tehran has enough uranium enriched to near-weapons-grade levels to make “several” nuclear bombs if it chooses to.

The International Atomic Energy Agency and Western nations assess Iran had an organized nuclear weapons program until 2003. Iran insists its program is peaceful while still enriching uranium to near weapons-grade levels.

Israel sees a nuclear-armed Iran as an existential threat and had long aspired to breaking up Iran’s regional network of allies — including Hamas, Lebanon's Hezbollah, the Houthi rebels in Yemen, and the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad, who was overthrown in December.

“For decades, the tyrants of Tehran have brazenly, openly called for Israel’s destruction,” Netanyahu said Friday. “They backed up their genocidal rhetoric with a program to develop nuclear weapons.”

Over the past four decades, Iran built up a network of militant proxy groups it called the “ Axis of Resistance ” that wielded significant power across the region in recent years but has suffered major setbacks since the Oct. 7 attack.

Hamas' military capabilities have been decimated in more than 20 months of ongoing war that has also killed tens of thousands of Palestinians, destroyed much of the Gaza Strip, displaced around 90% of its population and raised fears of famine.

Hezbollah traded strikes with Israel for nearly a year before Israel clobbered it with a sophisticated attack involving pagers and walkie-talkies, targeted strikes that killed most of its leaders and an air and ground campaign that devastated southern Lebanon.

The weakening of Hezbollah contributed to the downfall of Assad, which paved the way for Israel to seize parts of southern Syria and carry out strikes that destroyed much of its military assets.

Iran itself was weakened after two previous exchanges of fire with Israel, both linked to the war in Gaza. A wave of Israeli strikes last October destroyed missile sites and weakened Iran's air defenses.

Netanyahu said time was running out to strike Iran, alleging Iran had taken recent steps to weaponize enriched uranium. “If not stopped, Iran could produce a nuclear weapon within a very short time,” he said.

The United States and Israel have long vowed to take military action if necessary to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon, but President Donald Trump has been seeking a diplomatic solution after scrapping an earlier nuclear agreement with Iran during his first term.

A sixth round of talks was scheduled in Oman on Sunday, but it was unclear if they would be held in the aftermath of the strikes.

Israel has long been skeptical of such efforts, fearing they give Iran time to develop a weapon, and has said it would only accept an agreement in which Iran gives up its entire nuclear program — something Iran has vehemently ruled out.

On Thursday, for the first time in 20 years, the board of governors at the IAEA censured Iran for not working with its inspectors. Iran immediately announced it would establish a third enrichment site and swap out some centrifuges for more advanced ones.

Trump said he had asked Netanyahu not to attack Iran while the negotiations are ongoing, but the president has provided unprecedented support to Israel over the years, and his administration has so far expressed no opposition to Friday's strikes.

Follow AP’s war coverage at https://apnews.com/hub/israel-hamas-war

An Iranian protester holds up a poster of the Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in an anti-Israeli gathering in Tehran, Iran, Friday, June 13, 2025. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

The top floor of an apartment building damaged in an Israeli army strike is seen in Tehran, Iran's capital, Friday, June 13, 2025. (AP Photo)

Firefighters work the scene of an explosion at a residence compound in northern Tehran, Iran, Friday, June 13, 2025. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

A firefighter calls out his colleagues at the scene of an explosion in a residence compound in northern Tehran, Iran, Friday, June 13, 2025. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

Firefighters work the scene of an explosion at a residence compound in northern Tehran, Iran, Friday, June 13, 2025. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

Firefighters and people clean up the scene of an explosion at a residence compound after Israeli attacks in Tehran, Friday, June 13, 2025. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

Smoke rises up to the sky, in Tehran, Iran, Friday, June 13, 2025. (AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

Debris from an apartment building is seen on top of parked cars after a strike in Tehran, Iran, early Friday, June 13, 2025. Israel attacked Iran's capital early Friday, with explosions booming across Tehran.(AP Photo/Vahid Salemi)

AP Media Writer (AP) — An internal CBS News battle over a “60 Minutes” story critical of the Trump administration has exploded publicly, with a correspondent charging it was kept off the air for political reasons and news chief Bari Weiss saying Monday the story did not “advance the ball.”

Two hours before airtime Sunday, CBS announced that the story where correspondent Sharyn Alfonsi spoke to deportees who had been sent to El Salvador's notorious CECOT prison, would not be a part of the show. Weiss, the Free Press founder named CBS News editor-in-chief in October, said it was her decision.

The dispute puts one of journalism's most respected brands — and a frequent target of President Donald Trump — back in the spotlight and amplifies questions about whether Weiss' appointment was a signal that CBS News was headed in a more Trump-friendly direction.

Alfonsi, in an email sent to fellow “60 Minutes” correspondents said the story was factually correct and had been cleared by CBS lawyers and its standards division. But the Trump administration had refused to comment for the story, and Weiss wanted a greater effort made to get their point of view.

“In my view, pulling it now after every rigorous internal check has been met is not an editorial decision, it is a political one,” Alfonsi wrote in the email. She did not immediately respond to requests for comment from The Associated Press.

Alfonsi said in the email that interviews were sought with or questions directed to — sometimes both — the White House, State Department and Department of Homeland Security.

“Government silence is a statement, not a VETO,” Alfonsi wrote. “Their refusal to be interviewed is a tactical maneuver designed to kill the story. If the administration's refusal to participate becomes a valid reason to spike a story, we have effectively handed them a ‘kill switch’ for any reporting they find inconvenient.”

“Spike” is a journalist's term for killing a story. But Weiss, in a statement, said that she looked forward to airing Alfonsi's piece “when it's ready.”

Speaking Monday at the daily CBS News internal editorial call, Weiss was clearly angered by Alfonsi's memo. A transcript of Weiss' message was provided by CBS News.

“The only newsroom I'm interested in running is one in which we are able to have contentious disagreements about the thorniest editorial matters with respect and, crucially, where we assume the best intent of our colleagues,” Weiss said. “Anything else is completely unacceptable.”

She said that while Alfonsi's story presented powerful testimony about torture at the CECOT prison, The New York Times and other outlets had already done similar work. “To run a story on this subject two months later, we need to do more,” she said. “And this is ‘60 Minutes.’ We need to be able to get the principals on the record and on camera.”

It wasn't clear whether Weiss' involvement in seeking administration comment was sought. She reportedly helped the newscast arrange interviews with Jared Kushner and Steve Witkoff this past fall to discuss Trump's Middle East peace efforts. Trump himself was interviewed by Norah O’Donnell on a “60 Minutes” telecast that aired on Nov. 2.

Trump has been sharply critical of “60 Minutes.” He refused to grant the show an interview prior to last fall’s election, then sued the network over how it handled an interview with election opponent Kamala Harris. CBS’ parent Paramount Global agreed to settle the lawsuit by paying Trump $16 million this past summer. More recently, Trump angrily reacted to correspondent Lesley Stahl’s interview with Trump former ally turned critic Marjorie Taylor Greene.

“60 Minutes” was notably tough on Trump during the first months of his second term, particularly in stories done by correspondent Scott Pelley. In accepting an award from USC Annenberg earlier this month for his journalism, Pelley noted that the stories were aired last spring “with an absolute minimum of interference.”

Pelley said that people at “60 Minutes” were concerned about what new ownership installed at Paramount this summer would mean for the broadcast. “It’s early yet, but what I can tell you is we are doing the same kinds of stories with the same kind of rigor, and we have experienced no corporate interference of any kind,” Pelley said then, according to deadline.com.

David Bauder writes about the intersection of media and entertainment for the AP. Follow him at http://x.com/dbauder and https://bsky.app/profile/dbauder.bsky.social.

FILE - The CBS logo at the entrance to its headquarters, in New York Dec. 6, 2018. (AP Photo/Mark Lennihan, File)