The US State Department on Tuesday declined to comment on reports that Iran had arrested two American Jewish citizens on suspicion of spying for Israel in the aftermath of the recent 12-day war.
One of the two detainees, identified by HRANA as 70-year-old Yehuda Hekmati, remains in detention.
Hekmati, a jeweler with ties to New York, allegedly drew the attention of the Islamic Republic due to a trip he made to Israel seven years ago.
The second detainee, an Iranian-American resident of Los Angeles, has been released on bail.
US State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce declined to comment on the case Tuesday, saying only that she hopes she would be able to speak about it soon.
The State Department has repeatedly warned that Americans, including dual nationals, risk wrongful detention in Iran.
The department's website says: "Americans, including Iranian-Americans and other dual nationals, have been wrongfully detained, taken hostage by the Iranian government for months, and years."
Israel’s Channel 11 quoted a source involved in the American detainees’ case as saying, “These two Americans were in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
Crackdown on minorities and foreign nationals
In the aftermath of the war, Iranian authorities have intensified pressure on religious and ethnic minority groups, as well as foreign nationals, in what experts describe as an attempt to reassert control, deflect blame, and silence dissent.
Iran’s Jewish community has faced unprecedented scrutiny. Dozens have been interrogated over contacts with family in Israel, and Jewish conscripts have reportedly been forced to participate in loyalty demonstrations to the Islamic Republic.
Foreign nationals have not been spared. Several Europeans have been detained on charges of cooperating with Israel. French citizens Cécile Kohler and Jacques Paris, held in Iran since 2022, now face new espionage charges that could carry the death penalty.
Iran’s judiciary chief recently announced that over 2,000 people have been detained since the war with Israel, some facing charges of “organized collaboration with the enemy”—a charge that can carry the death penalty.
