Tensions are running high between Iran and Israel, which has not ruled out military strikes on the Islamic Republic if diplomatic efforts fail to resolve a row over Tehran’s nuclear program.

Iran has vowed to retaliate for any strikes with missile salvoes on Israel and US targets in the Gulf. “The Intelligence Ministry ... has identified and arrested members of a spy and terrorist network linked to the Zionist regime,” state television quoted a statement issued by the ministry as saying.

“The network of spies and terrorists linked to ... Mossad was destroyed. The network was behind the assassination of Masoud Ali-Mohammadi.”

A remote-controlled bomb killed the Tehran University scientist in Tehran on Jan. 12 last year. Iran blamed the United States and Israel for the killing. Washington has denied charges of involvement as “absurd.”

Under Iran’s penal code, imposed since its 1979 Islamic revolution, espionage can carry the death penalty. In December Iran hanged an Iranian man convicted of spying for Israel.

Another Iranian man was hanged in 2008 for allegedly working with Mossad. Israel denied having any links with the case.

“The Zionist regime used some European and non-European countries as well as some neighboring countries to carry out the assassination,” the statement said, without giving further details.

Another Iranian nuclear scientist was killed on Nov. 29 by a car bomb in Tehran and Iranian officials called it an Israeli or US-sponsored attack on its atomic program.

The Islamic state has been hit by foreign sanctions for refusing to suspend its uranium enrichment-related activities.

Western sources have said Ali-Mohammadi, a physics professor, worked closely with Mohsen Fakhrizadeh-Mahabadi and Fereydoun Abbassi-Davani, both named in UN sanctions resolutions because of their work on suspected nuclear weapons development.