JERUSALEM, Israel – Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett will present US President Joe Biden with a plan to curb Iran’s nuclear program during his first official visit to the White House on Thursday.
Speaking to the Cabinet on Sunday, Bennett said his visit comes at a critical time for the region and he will attempt to persuade Biden against re-entering the 2015 Iranian nuclear deal, known formally as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).
“I will tell President Biden that it is time to stop the Iranians, to stop this thing, not to give them a lifeline in the form of re-entering into an expired nuclear deal,” Bennett said, adding that the nuclear deal Iran signed with world powers “is no longer relevant.”
Both the American and Israeli leaders want to stop Iran from developing a nuclear weapon but disagree on strategy.
The Biden administration wants to change and re-enter the Iranian nuclear deal to curb the program. The deal provides sanctions relief to Iran in exchange for limits on the Islamic Republic’s nuclear program. Former President Donald Trump unilaterally abandoned the deal in 2018, arguing that Iran made the deal in bad faith and was pursuing nuclear weapons – a claim Iran vehemently denies.
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Bennett opposes the nuclear deal and has said Israel is ready to face Iran on its own if it must. Meanwhile, Iran continues to enrich uranium past the limits set by the nuclear deal and has been blamed for attacks on ships in the Persian Gulf.
“Iran is advancing rapidly with uranium enrichment and has already significantly shortened the time that it would take for them to accumulate the material required for a single nuclear bomb,” said Bennett.
Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz said earlier this month that Iran is “10 weeks away” from acquiring enough material to develop a nuclear bomb.
According to Bennett, Israel has been working on an alternative plan for the past two months to “curb the Iranians, both in the nuclear sphere and vis-à-vis regional aggression.”
The prime minister also said Israel has improved ties with Jordan and is working on “restoring relations with the entire region so that together we can build a coalition to block Islamic and Iranian extremism.”
Earlier this year, world powers revived talks in Vienna aimed at restoring the Iranian nuclear deal. However, those talks were suspended ahead of the installation of hardliner Ebrahim Raisi as Iran’s new president earlier this month.
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