Israel would have killed Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei were it possible during the countries’ 12-day war, Reuters reports quoting remarks by Defence Minister Israel Katz.

“I estimate that if Khamenei had been in our sights, we would have taken him out,” Katz says in the interview with Israel’s Kan public television network.

“But Khamenei understood this, went underground to very great depths,and broke off contacts with the commanders who replaced thosecommanders who were eliminated, so it wasn’t realistic in the end,” hesaid.