“In the early hours of Sunday, a missile hit the Weizmann Institute campus in Rehovot, on the southern outskirts of Tel Aviv, damaging several buildings and forcing researchers to brave the burning wreckage in an effort to recover vital samples.”
Israeli Researchers Race to Salvage Decades of Work After Iranian Missile Devastates Weizmann Institute Labs
Researchers at Israel’s renowned Weizmann Institute of Science have been working around the clock to rescue critical experiments after an Iranian missile destroyed a building housing dozens of state-of-the-art laboratories.
The missile struck the institute’s campus in Rehovot, on the southern outskirts of Tel Aviv, during the early hours of Sunday. Multiple buildings were damaged in the attack, prompting scientists to rush into the rubble—despite the raging fires—to recover vital research samples.
Fortunately, no casualties were reported as the campus was unoccupied overnight. However, a section of the affected building collapsed, and the remaining structure suffered severe damage, with walls blown out and the interior reduced to a wreck of twisted metal, charred debris, and shattered cement.
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“We did our best to save as many of the lab samples as possible, even while we were fighting the fire,” said physicist Roee Ozeri, Weizmann’s vice president for development and communications, speaking to Reuters.
On Friday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu visited the devastated site. He commended both the scientists and the emergency responders, calling them “the best of Israel.”
“This building behind me says everything,” Netanyahu said, gesturing toward the remains.
“Iran is the world’s leading terrorist regime. It must never be allowed to obtain nuclear weapons. Our actions are intended to protect Israel from the threat of annihilation—and, by extension, to safeguard many others around the globe.”
Israel launched strikes on Iran on June 13, alleging that Tehran was nearing the completion of a nuclear weapons program. Iran, which maintains that its nuclear activities are strictly for peaceful purposes, responded with coordinated missile and drone attacks on Israeli territory.
Israel’s retaliatory strikes have resulted in the deaths of several senior Iranian nuclear scientists, dealt a blow to Iran’s military leadership, and caused significant damage to the country’s nuclear infrastructure—while also resulting in the deaths of hundreds of civilians.
Iran has yet to comment on why, or even if, the Weizmann Institute was specifically targeted.
Last Thursday, the United Nations nuclear watchdog’s 35-member Board of Governors formally declared Iran in violation of its nuclear non-proliferation obligations—the first such finding in nearly two decades. Iran continues to assert that its program is peaceful.
Iranian strikes have killed 24 civilians in Israel and caused widespread damage to infrastructure, including a hospital in the southern city of Beersheba.
While most of the Weizmann Institute’s work focuses on medicine and basic science, it also maintains some partnerships with the defense sector. In October 2024, the institute announced a collaboration with Israeli defense giant Elbit Systems on developing “bio-inspired materials for defense applications.”
Founded in 1934, the Weizmann Institute is one of the world’s leading multidisciplinary research institutions. It is home to groundbreaking work in fields like genetics, immunology, neuroscience, physics, and astrophysics. The institute supports 286 research groups, 191 senior scientists, and hundreds of PhD candidates, master’s students, and postdoctoral researchers.
‘Everything is Lost’
The missile struck laboratories belonging to researchers like Professor Eldad Tzahor, who specializes in regenerative medicine with a focus on heart disease. Many of his long-term experiments and tissue samples were destroyed in the blast.
“Everything is lost,” Tzahor told Reuters TV. “It will likely take us a full year just to restore operations to their previous state and resume a full research schedule.”
The institute estimates the damage at $300–$500 million. The figure reflects not only the destruction of equipment, but also the disruption of access to sophisticated machines often shared between research teams.
Dr. Jacob Hanna, who leads a molecular genetics lab specializing in embryonic stem cell biology, told the journal Nature that his lab’s ceiling had collapsed, and the staircase had become detached.
Thankfully, Hanna’s students managed to rescue hundreds of frozen mouse and human cell lines by relocating them to backup liquid-nitrogen tanks that he had stored in the basement.
“I always feared that if war broke out, I’d lose these samples,” Hanna told Nature. “I’m grateful we were able to save them.”