American officials have confirmed rumors that Israel Air Force warplanes attacked a convoy of Iranian arms passing through Sudan en route to the Gaza Strip in January.

Officials apprised of classified intelligence assessments said that Israel carried out aerial attack as part of its effort to combat the smuggling of weapons into the Gaza Strip, according to The New York Times reported Friday.

The officials also said they had received intelligence reports that an Iranian Revolutionary Guards operative had gone to Sudan to help organize the effort said the report.

Vince Crawley, a spokesman for the United States Africa Command, said that US forces had not been involved in the bombing.

"The US military has not conducted any airstrikes, fired any missiles or undertaken any combat operations in or around Sudan since October 2008, when US Africa Command formally became responsible for U.S. military action in Africa," The NY Times quoted him as saying.

Israeli officials have declined to confirm or deny Israel's involvement in the air strike in Sudan. They also refused to comment on the various foreign media reports about the strike.

Israeli Channel 10 television broadcast an interview with a Sudanese minister's adviser who said that targets on or near Sudanese territory were bombed twice, and the second air strike destroyed a ship carrying Iranian arms.

Mubarak Mabrook Saleem, Sudan's State Minister for Transportation, said that he believed American planes were behind the bombings, which he said took place about a week apart.

He also claimed hundreds of people from several African states had been killed.

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