Iran Mulls Response as it Prepares to Bury Killed Nuclear Scientist

By Amir Havasi

Debate raged in Iran on Sunday over how and when to respond to a top nuclear scientist's assassination, blamed on arch-foe Israel, as his body was honoured at Shiite shrines to prepare it for burial.

Two days after Mohsen Fakhrizadeh died from wounds sustained in a firefight between his guards and unidentified gunmen near Tehran, parliament demanded a halt to international inspections of Iranian nuclear sites while a top official hinted Iran should leave the global non-proliferation treaty.

Iran's Supreme National Security Council usually handles decisions related to the country's nuclear programme, and parliamentary bills must be approved by the powerful Guardians Council.

President Hassan Rouhani has stressed the country will seek its revenge in "due time" and not be rushed into a "trap.”

Israel says Fakhrizadeh was the head of an Iranian military nuclear programme, the existence of which the Islamic republic has consistently denied, and Washington had sanctioned him in 2008 for activities linked to Iran's atomic activities.

The scientist's body was taken for a ceremony on Sunday at a major shrine in the holy city of Qom before being transported to the shrine of the Islamic republic's founder Imam Khomeini, according to Iranian media.Fakhrizadeh's funeral will be held Monday in the presence of senior military commanders and his family, the defence ministry said on its website, without specifying where.

Demands for 'Strong Reaction'

Israel has not officially commented on Fakhrizadeh's killing, less than two months before US President-elect Joe Biden is set to take office after four years of hawkish foreign policy under President Donald Trump. Trump withdrew the US from a multilateral nuclear agreement with Iran in 2018 and then reimposed and beefed up punishing sanctions as part of its "maximum pressure" campaign against Tehran.

Biden has signalled his administration may be prepared to rejoin the accord, but the nuclear scientist's assassination has revived opposition to the deal among Iranian conservatives.

The head of Iran's Expediency Council, a key advisory and arbitration body, said there was "no reason why (Iran) should not reconsider the Nuclear Proliferation Treaty".

Mohsen Rezaee said Tehran should also halt implementation of the additional protocol, a document prescribing intrusive inspections of Iran's nuclear facilitates.

Iran's supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called Saturday for Fakhrizadeh's killers to be punished. Parliament speaker Mohammad-Bagher Ghalibaf called Sunday for "a strong reaction" that would "deter and take revenge" on those behind the killing of Fakhrizadeh, who was aged 59 according to Iranian media.

Call for Strikes

For Israeli newspaper Haaretz, Fakhrizadeh's killing was clearly tied to Biden's arrival in office.

"The timing of the assassination, even if it was determined by purely operational considerations, is a clear message to President-elect Joe Biden, intended to show Israel's criticism" of plans to revive the deal, it said.

The UAE, which in September normalised ties with Israel, condemned the killing and urged restraint.

The foreign ministry, quoted by the official Emirati news agency WAM, said Abu Dhabi "condemns the heinous assassination of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, which could further fuel conflict in the region...

"The UAE calls upon all parties to exercise maximum degrees of self-restraint to avoid dragging the region into new levels of instability and threat to peace," it said.

Britain, a party to the nuclear accord, said Sunday it was "concerned" about possible escalation of tensions in the Middle East following the assassination, while Turkey called the killing an act of "terrorism" that "upsets peace in the region.”

In Iran, ultra-conservative Kayhan daily called for strikes on Israel if it were "proven" to be behind the assassination.

Kayhan called for the port city of Haifa to be targeted "in a way that would annihilate its infrastructure and leave a heavy human toll.”

Iran has responded to the US withdrawal from the 2015 deal by gradually abandoning most of its key nuclear commitments under the agreement.

'Revive Iran's Nuclear Industry

Rezaee called on Iran's atomic agency to take "minimum measures" such as "stopping the online broadcast of cameras, reducing or suspending inspectors and implementing restrictions in their access" to sites, ISNA news agency reported.

Iran's parliament said the "best response" to the assassination would be to "revive Iran's glorious nuclear industry.”

It called for International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) inspectors to be barred from the country's atomic sites, said the legislature's news agency ICANA.

Some MPs had earlier accused inspectors of acting as "spies" potentially responsible for Fakhrizadeh's death.

But the spokesman for Iran's atomic energy organisation, Behrouz Kamalvandi, told IRNA on Saturday that the issue of inspectors' access "must be decided on at high levels" of the Islamic republic's leadership.

Photo: IRNA

Iran Hit by New Fire that Destroys Shipyard

A fire broke out Wednesday at an Iranian shipyard in the southwestern port of Bushehr, damaging several vessels under construction without causing any casualties, local media reported. 

“An extensive fire has engulfed Delvar Kashti Bushehr boat factory," with thick smoke covering the area south of Bushehr city, state television IRIB reported. 

Five to seven vessels were damaged by the blaze, the cause of which was unknown, Bushehr government official Jahangir Dehghani was quoted as saying by the semi-official ISNA news agency.

Video footage on IRIB's website showed a fire truck and several men dousing smoldering vessels which appeared to be fishing boats.

Iran's only nuclear power plant is located about 20 kilometres (12 miles) from Bushehr.

The incident is the latest in a string of fires and explosions at military and civilian sites across Iran in recent weeks.

Two explosions rocked the capital Tehran in late June, one near a military site and the other in a health centre, the latter killing 19 people. 

Fires or blasts also hit a factory south of the city last week, leaving two people dead, and the Natanz nuclear complex, about 250 kilometres south of Tehran. 

Iranian authorities called the Natanz fire an "accident" without elaborating and later said they would not reveal the cause, citing "security reasons.”

The string of fires and explosions have prompted speculation in Iran that they may be the result of sabotage by Israel.

Photo: IRIB

German Tapped to Head INSTEX Withdraws After Israel Controversy

A German senior diplomat who had been designated to run INSTEX, a mechanism to allow trade with Iran despite US sanctions, will not assume the post, it emerged Friday, following controversial comments he made on Israel.

German's foreign office told AFP that Bernd Erbel, 71, had informed it "that he is not available for personal reasons".

Germany's top-selling newspaper Bild said Erbel's appointment was halted after it reported on controversial comments the ex-ambassador to Baghdad and Tehran had made in recent interviews.

Bild slammed "two scandalous appearances" in which Erbel had given long interviews to former public radio journalist Ken Jebsen, whom the tabloid-style paper accused of being "a conspiracy theorist and anti-Semite.”

Erbel had said that Israel represents "a foreign body in the region" and had been founded "at the expense of another people that lost their homeland".

He also said, according to the Bild article, that "the Palestinians are the victims of our victims. Quite simple.”

Bild also charged that Erbel had broadly shown a pro-Iran attitude and played down, for example, militancy by the Iranian Revolutionary Guards and their allies in the region.

he newspaper said in a rare English-language article on its website that "after Bild contacted Erbel regarding dubious interviews he had granted previously, he was forced to resign".

Germany, Britain and France in January founded the Instrument in Support of Trade Exchanges to facilitate barter trade with Iran to get around US sanctions that block financial transfers.

However, INSTEX is not yet operational.

Berlin remains in talks with London and Paris on filling the post of INSTEX managing director, which needs confirmation from the institution's supervisory board.

Photo: Anna McMaster

Pompeo on Middle East Tour to Counter Iran, Boost Netanyahu

Top US diplomat Mike Pompeo sought Wednesday to bolster a united front against Iran during a Middle East tour that will include talks with key ally Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ahead of Israeli elections.

The US secretary of state kicked off his regional tour in Kuwait where he met Emir Sheikh Sabah al-Ahmad Al-Sabah on the first stop of a trip that will also take him to Israel and Lebanon.

Pompeo told reporters on the flight from the United States that he would discuss "strategic dialogue" and the need to combat "the threat posed by the Islamic Republic of Iran" with leaders in the region.

He will also push for a greater role for the Middle East Strategic Alliance, a US-sponsored Arab NATO aimed at uniting Washington's Arab allies against Tehran.

After Kuwait Pompeo will fly to Israel where an election campaign is in its final weeks with Netanyahu locked in a close battle with centrist rivals.

While Washington insists it is not interfering in Israeli politics, his visit is seen as a sign of support for Netanyahu, who is struggling to keep his grip on power as he faces allegations of bribery, fraud and breach of trust ahead of the April 9 polls. 

"I'm going to Israel because of the important relationship we have," Pompeo said.

"Leaders will change in both countries over time. That relationship matters no matter who the leaders are."

Israel is one of the most outspoken members of the anti-Iranian grouping assembled by the US, and Iran is sure to be a central focus of Pompeo's talks in Jerusalem. 

'Important Relationship'

No meetings with Netanyahu's opponents are scheduled, and the secretary of state will not meet with representatives of the Palestinian Authority. 

"They'd have to want to talk to us," Pompeo said of the Palestinian officials. "That'd be a good start."

President Donald Trump's decision in December 2017 to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israeli delighted Netanyahu's government.

But it enraged Palestinians, who want to make the eastern, mainly Palestinian part of the city the capital of their future state.

Washington has taken a series of steps deemed so "hostile" by the Palestinian Authority that it now refuses any contact with the US administration. The moves include cutting most of the US aid to the Palestinians.

Pompeo's two-day visit to Jerusalem also includes a symbolic stop at the new US embassy, which was transferred from Tel Aviv on Trump's orders last year.

Netanyahu will travel to Washington in the last week of March for the annual conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), an event sponsored by the influential lobbying group that draws thousands each year.

While a meeting has not been officially confirmed, the Israeli premier hopes to use the opportunity of his Washington visit to meet with Trump. 

Peace Plan Countdown

A shift in semantics and policy has marked the Trump term, particularly related to the Middle East. 

The US has ceased to refer to Syria's Golan Heights as "Israeli-occupied" and instead calls the territory "controlled" by Israel—a change seen by some as a prelude to US recognition of Israeli sovereignty over the strategic plateau.

“That language reflects the facts as we understand them," Pompeo said. “This was a factual statement about how we observe the situation. And we think it's very accurate, and we stand behind it."

The April 9 vote in Israel will also start the countdown for the presentation, expected before the summer, of the Israeli-Palestinian peace plan that a small White House team—strongly pro-Israeli, analysts say—has been quietly preparing under the president's son-in-law, Jared Kushner. 

During Friday's Beirut leg of his trip, Pompeo will focus on the Hezbollah movement, which the US considers a pro-Iranian "terrorist" group even though it is represented in the coalition government of Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri, himself a US ally.

Photo Credit: State Department

Netanyahu Says Israel is Arabs' 'Ally' Against Iran

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Monday that Arab countries viewed Israel as an "indispensable ally" fighting Iran and the Islamic State group.

That evaluation, he told Brazil's Globo TV during a visit to Rio, has caused "a revolution in relations with the Arab world."

The comments came as Israel has stepped up air strikes on Iranian positions in neighboring Syria, and as Israel digested an abrupt decision by President Donald Trump to withdraw US troops from Syria.

Netanyahu has repeatedly warned that Iran is trying to develop nuclear weapons to destroy his country.

Israel, he said, had shown itself to be active in battling "radical Islam, violent Islam—either the one led by radical Shiites led by Iran, or the one led by the radical Sunnis led by Daesh (IS) and Al-Qaeda."

"Unfortunately we have not made any advance with the Palestinians. Half of them are already under the gun of Iran and of radical Islam," Netanyahu added.

Asked if he could ever contemplate sitting down with an Iranian leader to talk peace, Netanyahu replied: "If Iran remains committed to our destruction the answer is no."

The only way, he said, would be "if Iran undergoes a total transformation."

Netanyahu was in Brazil to attend Tuesday's inauguration of the Latin American country's new, pro-Israel president, Jair Bolsonaro.

On the sidelines of the ceremony, Netanyahu was to hold talks with US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who is also among the visiting dignitaries.

They were expected to discuss the US troop pullout from Syria and Iranian activities in the Middle East. 

Photo Credit: Netanyahu Twitter

Netanyahu: Israel Would Hit Iran to Ensure its Own Survival

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Wednesday that Israel would be prepared to attack inside Iran if the Jewish state's survival was at stake.

 "Our red line is our survival," Netanyahu said at a meeting with foreign media where he was asked what his "red line" was for attacking Iranian territory, rather than its proxies in Syria and Lebanon.

"We do what is necessary to protect the state of Israel against the Iranian regime that openly calls for the annihilation of the Jewish state."

"I'm not ruling out doing anything that we need to do to defend ourselves," added Netanyahu, who sees Iran as the most dangerous threat to Israel.

He said that Israel is the only country whose military is "directly engaging Iranian forces" with air strikes in neighboring Syria, where Iran supports the forces of President Bashar al-Assad.

Netanyahu said Wednesday that Iran's aggressive regional behavior, in contrast to Israel's fight against radical Islamic militants and its advanced technology, had brought once-hostile Arab states closer to the Jewish state.

"The Arab countries understand exactly that Israel is not their enemy, but their indispensable partner" against extremists, he said, speaking of "new relationship between Israel and the Arab world".

Israel has diplomatic relations with only two Arab countries—Egypt and Jordan—but has recently been pushing to broaden regional ties.

A rapprochement with Saudi Arabia in particular, a regional heavyweight and rival of Iran, would be a considerable breakthrough for Israel.

Netanyahu said that a balanced diplomatic response was needed to the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in his country's consulate in Istanbul on October 2, which sparked a global outcry.

While he described the crime as "horrific, nothing short of that," he said that every country, especially those with formal relations with Saudi Arabia, must decide how to react.

"It's balanced by the importance of Saudi Arabia and the role it plays in the Middle East, because if Saudi Arabia were to be destabilized the world would be destabilized... and I think that has to be taken into account, there's a balance," he said.

Photo Credit: Wikicommons

Iran Vows to Fight Trump's Israel-Palestinian Deal

Iran is determined to fight against US Donald Trump's anticipated Israel-Palestinian peace plan, parliament speaker Ali Larijani said Tuesday according to semi-official news agency ISNA.

Trump has dubbed his administration's long-awaited plan the "ultimate deal.” which has already unsettled the Palestinians although no details have yet been disclosed.

Speaking in Tehran, Larijani said the "deal of the century" was a "plot" between Iran's arch foe Israel and the United States to establish the Jewish state's domination in the Middle East.

"We will stand against the regime of Israel and won't let this deal take place in the region," Larijani said at an annual conference on Islamic unity.

"If Americans are imposing sanctions on Iran today and are putting pressure on Iran, the reason for it is because Iran has stood against Israel," he added, quoted by ISNA.

Earlier this year, Washington pulled out of the landmark international nuclear accord with Iran and reimposed crippling sanctions on Tehran.

"In order to achieve their objective they try to create new political arrangements in the region," Larijani said of US-Israeli strategy in the Middle East.

The parliament speaker also singled out regional rival Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) as he warned countries against normalizing relations with Israel.

Countries in the region "should know that they would not benefit at all by letting (Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin) Netanyahu to their countries", Larijani said.

"People in the region, in any country, regard Israel as a cancerous tumour and hate it," he added.

Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman earlier this year reaffirmed his country's "steadfast" support for the Palestinian cause, after coming under fire for saying both Israelis and Palestinians "have the right to have their own land".

Israel has diplomatic relations with just two Arab states—Egypt and Jordan—but Netanyahu has been pushing for broader regional ties.

The Israeli premier travelled to Oman in October, while two of his ministers visited the UAE.

Photo Credit: IRNA

IAEA Fends Off Israel Pressure Over Iran

The UN's nuclear watchdog Tuesday refused to "take at face value" Israel's claims that Iran is harboring a secret atomic warehouse, fending off pressure to inspect the allegedly suspect site.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made the claim in front of the UN General Assembly last week.

Without explicitly referring to Netanyahu's claim, IAEA chief Yukiya Amano insisted that the agency's independence was "of paramount importance" for its work.

The IAEA "uses all safeguards-relevant information available to it but it does not take any information at face value," Amano said in a statement.

Netanyahu accused Iran of operating a "secret atomic warehouse for storing massive amounts of equipment and material from Iran's secret nuclear weapons program."

He urged the IAEA to inspect the site.

Amano said the IAEA would not be told how to do its work.

"All information obtained, including from third parties, is subject to rigorous review," he said.

He said the IAEA's work "must always be impartial, factual, and professional."

Under the 2015 deal, Iran agreed to scale down its nuclear activities and submit to IAEA inspections in exchange for relief from sanctions.

Israel bitterly opposes the deal and congratulated US President Donald Trump for walking away from it earlier this year.

The IAEA has repeatedly said that Iran is continuing to meet its commitments under the deal.

Amano said on Tuesday that evaluations of Iran's compliance were "ongoing.”

Photo Credit: IRNA

Netanyahu Accuses Europe of 'Appeasing' Iran

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Wednesday accused European leaders of "appeasing" Iran instead of confronting its militant activity.

Netanyahu's remarks, made in a cabinet meeting, feed into his ongoing efforts to sway world leaders to join the United States in upping pressure on Israel's arch foe through sanctions.

"The time has come for the world to unite in the fight against terrorist organizations. It is doing so to a certain extent against the Islamic State group, but it is not doing so against Iran," Netanyahu said.

He accused European leaders of "appeasing" and "reconciling" with Iran.

In May, US President Donald Trump withdrew from a nuclear deal between Iran and world powers, before re-imposing a first major round of unilateral sanctions on Tehran in August.

Netanyahu had consistently called for the landmark 2015 accord to be altered or scrapped, saying it was too limited in scope and time-frame, and did nothing to stop Iran financing militant activities in the region.

European powers are seeking to save the nuclear deal and have vowed to keep providing Iran with the economic benefits it received from the accord.

Germany, France and Britain—and other signatories Russia and China—argue that the agreement has worked as intended in keeping Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons for now.

"The appeasement of Iran abets the relentless assault on the values and security of the free societies, and the time has come for Western governments to join the strong and clear effort by the Trump administration against the terror regime in Tehran," Netanyahu said on Wednesday.

Washington has sought to build up multilateral pressure on Iran and has set a November 5 deadline for halting its oil exports.

Photo Credit: Wikicommons

Netanyahu and Top Trump Aide Call on Europe to Pressure Iran

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump's national security adviser met in Jerusalem Monday and called on European nations to do more to pressure Iran.

John Bolton arrived in Israel on Sunday for three days of talks expected to focus mainly on Iran and its presence in Syria.

Netanyahu strongly urged Trump to withdraw from the nuclear deal between Israel's main enemy Iran and world powers, and the US president did so in May, resulting in the reimposition of sanctions.

Israel and the United States have been closely aligned on their approach to Iran since Trump took office.

"I frankly believe that all countries who care about peace and security in the Middle East should follow America's lead and ratchet up the pressure on Iran," Netanyahu told journalists.

"Because the greater the pressure on Iran, the greater the chance that the regime will roll back its aggression. And everybody should join this effort."

The comments were a veiled reference to European countries, which are seeking to save the nuclear deal and have vowed to keep providing Iran with the economic benefits it received from the accord.

They argue that the nuclear deal is working as intended in keeping Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons for now.

Bolton said "it's a question of the highest importance for the United States that Iran never get a deliverable nuclear weapons capability."

"It's why President Trump withdrew from the wretched Iran nuclear deal," he said, speaking alongside Netanyahu.

"It's why we've worked with our friends in Europe to convince them of the need to take stronger steps against the Iranian nuclear weapons and ballistic missile program."

The United States and Israel argue the deal was too limited in scope and timeframe while also allowing Iran to finance militant activities in the region due to the lifting of sanctions.

Bolton's trip will also take him later in the week to Ukraine and Geneva, where he will meet with his Russian counterpart Nikolai Patrushev on Thursday.

The meeting in Geneva is a follow-up to Trump's highly controversial July summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki, according to the White House.

Iran is backing Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in his country's civil war along with Russia and Lebanese Shiite militant group Hezbollah.

Netanyahu has pledged to prevent Iran from entrenching itself militarily in neighboring Syria, and a series of recent strikes that have killed Iranians.there have been attributed to Israel.

He has also pressed Putin to guarantee that Iranian forces in Syria and their allies, such as Hezbollah, will be kept far away from the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights.

Photo Credit: PM Israel

Netanyahu Heads to Europe Seeking About-Face on Iran

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu embarks Monday on a three-day European tour in Germany set to be dominated by strategic differences on Iran, as leaders attempt to rescue the nuclear deal after US withdrawal.

With partners in Berlin, Paris and London still reeling from President Donald Trump's decision last month to exit the hard-fought 2015 accord, Netanyahu is expected to seek European cooperation on a still-to-be-determined Plan B.

"The aim to prevent Iran from developing any kind of nuclear capacity was always the foundation of international policy on Iran," Israel's ambassador to Germany, Jeremy Issacharoff, told AFP ahead of the visit.

Issacharoff said that despite "differences of opinion" on how to achieve the aim of hemming in Iran on nuclear matters, "we share the same goal".

Germany, France and Britain are three of the signatories of the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) between world powers and Iran, aimed at keeping Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons.

Netanyahu, who has railed against the deal which offers sanctions relief in exchange for strict limits on Iran's nuclear activities, will hold talks with Chancellor Angela Merkel in Berlin in the late afternoon, followed by a joint news conference.

He will continue on to Paris for meetings with French President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday and British Prime Minister Theresa May on Wednesday.

'Not Perfect'

In the face of the US retreat, all three leaders strongly defend the agreement as the best way to head off a regional arms race and have vowed with Russia and China, the two other signatory countries, to keep it alive.

German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas huddled with his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi on Thursday and insisted that Berlin "wants to maintain the nuclear agreement and make sure Iran maintains it too."

At the same news conference, Wang launched an unvarnished attack on US reliability in global affairs under Trump.

"It is a truism of international law that international accords must be respected... (and) major countries must set an example, not do the opposite," he said.

Supporters also fear the reimposition of US sanctions could hit European firms that have done business with Iran since the accord was signed.

Merkel has acknowledged that while European powers see the JCPOA as the best guarantee against an Iran with nuclear weapons, it is "not perfect".

The Europeans have proposed hammering out a supplementary deal with Tehran covering its ballistic missile program as well as its interventions in countries such as Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen.

Western powers view Iran's meddling as destabilizing for the region while Israel sees it as a direct threat to its existence.

"I will discuss with them ways to block Iran's nuclear aspirations and Iran's expansion in the Middle East," Netanyahu said last week of his European meetings, noting the issues were "crucial to Israel's security".

Israel is considered the leading military power in the Middle East and believed to be the only country in the region to possess nuclear weapons.

 

Photo Credit: Kremlin.ru

Netanyahu to Speak on 'Significant Development' on Iran Nuclear Deal

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will speak Monday on a "significant development" on the Iran nuclear deal, his office said, as the White House considers whether to pull out of the landmark accord that Israel opposes.

Netanyahu will give the statement at Israel's defence ministry in Tel Aviv at 8:00 pm (1700 GMT). It follows US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's visit on Sunday and a telephone conversation between Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump on Saturday.

Trump is due to decide on May 12 whether to reimpose sanctions on Tehran, putting in peril the 2015 nuclear accord.

Pompeo has warned that the United States will withdraw from the agreement "if we can't fix it."

The Israeli premier has repeatedly called for the accord between world powers and his country's main enemy to either be altered or scrapped.

He alleges the agreement does not prevent Iran from eventually obtaining nuclear weapons and says the lifting of sanctions has increased Tehran's ability to finance proxy militants in the Middle East.

Most world powers however say the nuclear deal is working as intended for now and is the best way to keep Iran from acquiring the bomb.

Israel is also deeply concerned over Iran's presence in Syria, where it is backing President Bashar al-Assad's regime.

Netanyahu has pledged to stop Iran from entrenching itself militarily in the neighbouring country.

On Monday, a monitor said missile strikes on central Syria killed 26 pro-regime fighters, most of them Iranians, in a raid it said bore the hallmarks of an Israeli operation.

Israeli Intelligence Minister Yisrael Katz told army radio that he was "not aware" of the strikes.

The latest such attacks came amid heightened tensions after Damascus and Tehran accused Israel on April 9 of conducting deadly strikes against a military base in central Syria.

Pompeo joined Netanyahu in lashing out at Iran when the two met in Tel Aviv on Sunday. "Iran's ambition to dominate the Middle East remains," Pompeo said.

Photo Credit: Wikicommons

Netanyahu Turns Up Volume as Iran Deadline Nears

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made a fresh call Monday for an overhaul of the Iran nuclear deal as US President Donald Trump's deadline for further Iranian concessions edged closer.

Trump has threatened to tear up the 2015 agreement that lifted sanctions on Iran in exchange for curbs to its nuclear activity, unless it curbs its ballistic missile program by May 12.

"Israel will not allow regimes that seek our annihilation to acquire nuclear weapons," Netanyahu told an audience of diplomats in a speech in Jerusalem.

"This is why this deal has to be either fully fixed or fully nixed," he said in English.

Iran says it is ready to relaunch its nuclear program—which the West suspects is designed to produce a bomb—if Trump kills the deal.

Netanyahu said the 2015 agreement leaves Iran able to quickly reboot its nuclear program to enable military production.

"It gives Iran a clear path to a nuclear arsenal," he said. "It allows, over a few years, unlimited enrichment of uranium, the core ingredient required to produce nuclear bombs."

The United States delivered much the same message Monday, at a meeting of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in Geneva.

Christopher Ford, US Assistant Secretary for International Security and Nonproliferation, said the Islamic republic's nuclear program remained "dangerously close to rapid weaponization."

Iran insists it never intended to build a nuclear weapon.

Photo Credit: Wikicommons