Tel Aviv: Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz warned on Tuesday that Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei could face a similar fate of Iraq's Saddam Hussein. “Remember what happened to the dictator in the neighbouring country of Iran who took this path against Israel,” Katz said.

Saddam Hussein was convicted of crimes against humanity —including wilful killing, illegal imprisonment, deportation, and torture — and was sentenced to death by hanging. Saddam’s half-brother (an intelligence officer) and Iraq’s former chief judge were also sentenced to death.

Days after an Iraqi court upheld his sentence in December 2006, Saddam was executed.

The threat comes even as a senior US official said that US President Donald Trump had intervened to prevent Israel from carrying out an assassination of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

But Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu did not rule out the possibility when asked about the reports during an interview with ABC News.

"It's not going to escalate the conflict, it's going to end the conflict," he said. Netanyahu has insisted that Israel's campaign against Iran was “changing the face of the Middle East”, as the two countries traded heavy strikes for a fifth day. The remarks came hours after a dramatic attack on an Iranian state TV building, which forced a presenter to flee mid-broadcast and prompted a threat of retaliation against Israeli news channels.

After decades of enmity and a prolonged shadow war, Israel launched a surprise aerial campaign against Iran last week, with the stated aim of preventing Tehran from acquiring atomic weapons – an ambition it denies.

The sudden flare-up has sparked fears of a wider conflict, with US President Donald Trump urging Iran back to the negotiating table after Israel's attacks derailed ongoing nuclear talks.