Prime Minister Yair Lapid said today (Sunday) that the IDF and the Mossad have been instructed to prepare themselves for any scenario regarding the Iran issue, whether there is an agreement or not and Iran goes nuclear. According to him, Israel will not let Iran become a nuclear weapon state. In a conversation with reporters In Jerusalem, Lapid said that the agreement currently being formed between Iran and the powers is a bad agreement. According to Lapid, the agreement was already bad when it was signed in 2015, and today the dangers inherent in it are even greater. It is closer to its end date, and Iran is in a different place technologically , explained.
“We are paying to this day for the damages caused by Netanyahu’s speech in Congress”
“We must not reach the situation we were in in 2015. We are still paying for the damage caused by Netanyahu’s speech to Congress, as a result of which the American administration stopped the dialogue with us and did not allow Israel to introduce amendments to the agreement,” Lapid claimed, adding: “Our political directive, from day one, It is to fight against the agreement with all our might, but without harming the strategic relations with the US.”
However, Lapid admitted that even after the current government’s efforts, the current agreement is bad, and does not meet the lines set by the Americans themselves at the beginning of the negotiations. “Iran can and should be made to sign a much better agreement – what the Americans themselves called: Longer & Stronger. Longer – because it will be an agreement without an end date, as proposed by French President Emmanuel Macron. Stronger – because the supervision will be closer, and it will also deal with Iran’s ballistic missile program and Iran’s involvement in terrorism throughout the Middle East. Such an agreement can be reached if a credible military threat is put on the table. If the Iranians see that their refusal and their deceptions have a heavy price. This is what led the Iranians to sign the agreement last time. President Obama advertised the capabilities of the so-called Bunker Busters – bombs that penetrate bunkers, and the Iranians took the hint and signed the agreement.”
“Regarding the latest proposal put on the table by the European Union, we told the Americans: ‘This is not what President Biden wanted. This is not what he spoke about during his visit to Israel, this is not what he signed in the Jerusalem Declaration.’ At the same time we made it clear to the Americans: The State of Israel will not be dependent In Iran’s decisions and not in the decisions of the powers. As written in the Jerusalem Declaration, we have the right to defend ourselves. If an agreement is signed – it does not bind us. We are not a party to it and it will not limit our actions,” added Lapid.
There is still an opening for influence on the part of Israel
The details of the emerging agreement indicate that it is conditional, among other things, on the approval of the American Congress, where President Biden is expected to face strong opposition, and not only from the Republican side. If Congress rejects the agreement, the president can veto the decision and only a two-thirds majority of the members of Congress can pass an opposing resolution. A political source made it clear that Israel does not intend to intervene directly in the debate as Netanyahu did in a speech to the American Congress before the approval of the nuclear agreement in 2015, but “we talk to everyone who approaches us on the issue”.
According to the source, Mossad head Dedi Barnea will arrive in Washington soon and speak before the Special Services Committee in Congress. The details of the agreement also indicate that the United States will begin releasing frozen Iranian funds from day one, and will lift sanctions from 17 Iranian banks. In the intermediate stages, the United States will allow oil exports of up to 50 million barrels per day, and after Iran fulfills its share, full exports will be allowed. However, according to what is known in Israel there are still unclosed sections and the litigation between the parties continues, which still leaves an opening for a certain influence of Israel.
Israel sees an achievement in the fact that the lifting of some of the sanctions on Iranian entities such as the Revolutionary Guards was postponed, that relations with the United States were not damaged, as well as the promises to create a kind of alliance (regional architecture) with the countries of the region against the possibility of an Iranian attack. The senior political official admitted that the hopes of Israel for the Americans to stand on the lines they themselves set was rejected.
“We have shown more than once that the Iranians are lying about the nuclear program”
According to the same political source, Iran cannot be trusted to uphold the agreement and not continue to enrich uranium in secret: “Israel is very concerned about the possibility that the Iranians are enriching more than they are reporting, there is a possibility that they are enriching more, keeping more material. Ten days ago they asked Grossi (chairman International Atomic Energy Agency – d.g) regarding the commitment or regarding the open files. He said: ‘We found traces of uranium.’ where? They said to him: ‘Do you trust the Iranians?’, his answer was: ‘absolutely not’. Because obviously they cheat. We have shown the world more than once that the Iranians cheat and lie about their nuclear program and do not bind themselves to the agreement.”
In the political issues, the source referred to the joint running agreement between Smotrich and Ben Gabvir: “The fact that there is legitimacy here for entities like Ben Gabvir and his partners is alarming and it also destroys national security. I don’t see a government where there is a senior minister and cabinet member Ben Gabvir who receives a tenth of the attention from the Americans And the Europeans who accept a government like ours. So this has an impact on national security. I certainly agree that the erosion of internal resilience is the greatest threat to Israeli society, partly because it reduces our ability to deal with an external threat.”
The source referred to the briefings of the head of the Mossad, Dedi Barnea, who opposed the agreement much more strongly than Lapid himself, while criticizing the Americans. The briefing happened shortly after a meeting on the subject between Lapid and Barnea. According to the political source, Barnea’s words were not interpreted properly and the Prime Minister spoke with him twice after the briefings to clarify things.
In the meantime, it is clarified in Jerusalem that there was no conversation between Prime Minister Lapid and President Biden due to Biden’s vacation and such a conversation should take place soon. The two will probably not meet at the UN assembly next month either, due to “constraints of the president’s schedule and due to Lapid’s son’s wedding.”