Netanyahu slams proposed Iranian nuclear deal

Israel’s leaders breathed a sigh of relief after last weekend’s talks between the Western powers ended without agreement.

US Secretary of State John Kerry has said that the talks brought the opposing sides close to an agreement on Iran’s nuclear program – but there was no breakthrough.

Jerusalem was deeply worried about the terms being offered to Iran over the weekend, claiming that they would not have neutralised the threat that the country poses. “The time that was gained over the weekend must be utilised to achieve a much better deal,” declared Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the Knesset on Monday.

The “time” that Netanyahu referred to may be limited – Iran meets the Western powers again on Wednesday, and other moves are afoot by Iran to increase its international standing. This week it signed an agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency to let its inspectors into two more of its nuclear sites, which pleases the West but is viewed by many in the Israeli establishment as a way of giving a false sense of security.

In his comments on Monday Netanyahu that a deal should only be agreed when one is on offer that “will deny Iran a military nuclear capability.” He added: “This is important not just for Israel but for the entire world. We will continue to say this simple truth in a clear voice because this is what needs to be done.”

Netanyahu insisted: “Israel is united in opposition to the deal being offered to Iran.”

At the cabinet meeting the previous day, Netanyahu reported that he had spoken to Western leaders about the negotiations and said that the proposed deal is “dangerous for world peace because it lowers the pressure of sanctions that took years to build while on the other hand, Iran, in practice, retains its nuclear enrichment capability as well as the ability to advance along the plutonium track.”

While Netanyahu is prone to dramatic declarations on Iran’s nuclear threat, analysts believe that his alarm about the potential deal is genuine. “What’s happened here is that Israel and the United States’ Arab allies don’t exactly know what the bottom line of those negotiating is and that’s what’s freaking them out,” said Jonathan Rynhold, a researcher at the Begin-Sadat Centre for Strategic Studies.

Rynhold, who has just published a paper on the Iranian threat, told The AJN that Israel and Arab allies of America – who share concerns about Iran – are “worried that they are going to be sold out.”

Netanyahu, meanwhile, continued his hard line against Iran’s nuclear program in an address to the Jewish Federations of North America General Assembly, repeatedly telling the gathering of American Jewish leaders in Jerusalem that the compromise being formulated is a “bad deal”.

“What is being proposed now is a deal in which Iran retains all of that capacity.

“Not one centrifuge is dismantled; not one. Iran gets to keep tons of low enriched uranium.”

NATHAN JEFFAY