Cyprus says a joint operation with Mossad has foiled a suspected Iranian plot to kill Israelis

Cyprus says it has disrupted an alleged Iranian plot to target Israeli businessmen with the arrest of two Iranian asylum-seekers who were in contact with another Iranian associated with the Revolutionary Guard

NICOSIA, Cyprus -- Cyprus has disrupted an alleged Iranian plot to target Israeli businessmen with the arrest of two Iranian asylum-seekers who were in contact with another Iranian associated with the Revolutionary Guard, a Cypriot official said Tuesday.

The official told The Associated Press the two Iranian men have been in police custody since Nov. 3 and procedures were underway to deport them.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he’s not allowed to speak publicly about national security matters, said the suspects’ detention was the culmination of a joint operation with Israel’s Mossad security service.

Cypriot security services had been surveilling the two Iranian men for several weeks and detained them just before what authorities believe would have been the arrival of a squad to carry out killings, the official said. The targeted individuals were primarily Israeli businessmen, the official said.

Cypriot authorities said the suspects’ Iranian handler moved in and out of Cyprus through the ethnically divided island nation’s breakaway Turkish Cypriot north and would cross a U.N.-controlled buffer zone into the internationally recognize south to establish contact with the two. His identity and whereabouts were not revealed but the official said he worked for Iran's elite Revolutionary Guard.