Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid is urging the United States to increase pressure on Iran to reengage with a defunct nuclear arms treaty, saying the country will not consider returning to the negotiating table without a "credible military threat."
Lapid told reporters Sunday that the United States not only needed to present weaponry similar to the bunker-busting bombs the country used to leverage a deal in 2015, but to maintain those weapons as a strong deterrent against Iran to prevent it from violating a future arms agreement or from developing a nuclear weapon when the deal expires.
The U.S. and others, Lapid said, would have to push Iran to sign a longer and stronger agreement, an agreement the prime minister said could only be reached "with a credible military threat, so the Iranians see they will have to pay a heavy price for their recalcitrance," The Jerusalem Post reported.
Shortly after, Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi fired back at Lapid in a rare news conference denouncing Israel, saying the country would not return to the negotiating table unless international inspectors ended their probe on man-made uranium particles found at sites within the country, an apparent violation similar to what prompted former President Donald Trump to withdraw from the deal in 2018.
Currently, inspectors with the International Atomic Energy Agency believe Iran has at least a 4-ton stockpile of enriched uranium, with some stores at a level of purity sufficient to construct at least one nuclear bomb. Iran has repeatedly denied pursuing a nuclear arms program over the years, but Israeli officials have consistently challenged that claim.
The news came as Israeli intelligence Director David Barnea is slated to travel to Washington, D.C., to discuss details of a prospective nuclear deal as negotiations between the United States, Iran and the European Union remain on the verge of a breakthrough. While Lapid characterized the most recent draft proposal as a "final offer" to the Iranians, Iran has requested additional concessions in the deal, putting the ball back in the Americans' court to negotiate a final agreement.
Meanwhile, Israel—a key geopolitical ally of the United States—has threatened to prevent Iran's alleged continued pursuit of a nuclear arms program if a final deal isn't reached. In recent years, Iranian officials have accused the country of targeting Iranian nuclear sites, and they are still contending with the political fallout from an alleged attack of a top nuclear scientist in 2020.
Barnea, Axios reported Monday, will work to further pressure the Biden administration's policy on the deal via a number of closed-door meetings with the House and Senate intelligence committees as well as with top Biden officials to reaffirm Israel's position on the deal, which is substantially stricter than the accord struck between Iran and the U.S. in 2015.
Iran, meanwhile, has begun forging closer ties with U.S. adversaries like China and Russia, who Raisi said Monday are currently seen as more reliable partners on the world stage.
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Nick Reynolds is a senior politics reporter at Newsweek. A native of Central New York, he previously worked as a ... Read more
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