US: ‘Iran To Have Nuclear Weapon Material Within 2 Weeks’; ‘Destruction Israel Near’ (Worthy News In-depth)
By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News
TEHRAN/JERUSALEM (Worthy News) – Israel experienced more uncertainty Saturday, with the United States saying Iran will have enough weapons-grade material for a nuclear weapon within two weeks and fresh warnings that the Jewish nation would be destroyed by 2040.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken told a security forum in Colorado that “we’ve seen in the last weeks and months is an Iran that’s actually moving forward.”
Instead “of being at least a year away from having breakout capacity to produce fissile material for a nuclear weapon, they’re probably one or two weeks away from doing that,” Blinken stressed, adding that “where we are now is not a good place.”
He blamed the pace of this progress on the U.S. withdrawal from a 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and global powers known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA.)
Former U.S. President Donald J. Trump unilaterally withdrew from the deal in 2018, calling it “defective at its core.”
The deal involved easing sanctions on Iran in exchange for stricter oversight of its nuclear program to prevent the construction of atomic weapons.
However, Trump has argued that policies under current President Joe Biden made Iran richer and more dangerous towards Israel and others.
TARGETING ISRAEL
Blinken’s warnings added to concerns in Israel that Iran seeks nuclear capabilities to destroy Israel within years, influential sources said.
Brigadier General Jacob Nagel, a former national security adviser to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and Mark Dubowitz, an expert on Iran’s nuclear program and sanctions, shared those concerns.
Both men, who now have senior roles in the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, wrote in The Jerusalem Post newspaper that Iran may destroy Israel by 2040.
“The Islamic Republic is developing a comprehensive strategy to bring about Israel’s elimination as a sovereign state. In a social media post in 2015, [Supreme Leader of Iran Ali] Khamenei told Israelis that their state would be destroyed by 2040. “God willing, there will be nothing of the Zionist regime in 25 years,” he wrote.
“We should take the supreme leader at his word and understand that he will do everything possible to realize that genocidal goal, in cooperation with the forces that support him at home and abroad,” Nagel and Dubowitz wrote in a commentary monitored by Worthy News.
They recalled that the Islamic Republic had invested “heavily in conventional weapons to attack Israel, as demonstrated by the unprecedented attack on the Jewish state on the night of April 13, when Tehran launched over 300 ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, and drones.”
Iran has also “pursued its nuclear weapon ambitions, in the first place, as a means of deterring Israel from defending itself against conventional attacks. And in the second place, to give it weapons of mass destruction to destroy Israel.” Tehran claims its nuclear program is for “peaceful purposes,” but Israel and most of its allies do not believe Iran’s Islamic rulers.
FIRE RING
The two experts also noticed that Iran is turning the heat up on its “ring of fire” encircling Israel, “combining military strategy with lawfare and propaganda efforts.”
They said that “Israel is being dragged into a regional war on several fronts, including Judea and Samaria and Gaza, where Iran’s proxy Hamas holds sway.”
There is also “Lebanon, where [Iran’s] most powerful ally Hezbollah continues to be the most powerful element in that shattered country.”
Additionally, they mentioned “Yemen, where Houthi rebels backed by Tehran have declared their support for Hamas by all but shutting down commercial traffic through the Red Sea with missile attacks on civilian shipping.”
Other threats for Israel include “Iraq, where the Iranians have armed and trained Islamist militias; and Syria, where President Bashar al-Assad’s regime has emerged unchallenged from the civil war, thanks to the backing of Iran and Russia,” they wrote.
The experts also noticed that in addition to these military fronts, “Khamenei has launched a campaign of lawfare and diplomatic warfare, supporting attempts at the International Criminal Court and the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to demonize Israel.”
On Friday, the ICH ruled that Israel’s “occupation of Palestinian territories” is unlawful, ordering the state to bring an “end to its occupying presence” as well as to make reparations for damage done.
OCCUPATION CLAIM
The ICJ claimed Israel’s control or “occupation” of “Palestinian territories,” including Judea and Samaria, also known as the West Bank, as well as the Gaza Strip and East Jerusalem, “is illegal under international law.”
Yet Christian groups called it the Biblical lands promised to Israel, while Prime Minister Netanyahu also condemned the court’s advisory opinion about the “historic homeland” of Jews.
And with Iran now close to obtaining nuclear weapons, Israel faces more threats than ever in its modern history, experts suggest.
“In that sense, the “election,” or more precisely Khamenei’s selection, of Masoud Pezekshian as Iran’s new president through a ballot vetted and controlled by the supreme leader and his Guardian Council is something of a masterstroke. Pezekshian is depicted in large parts of the Western media as a “moderate” and a “reformer,” which plays directly into Khamenei’s hands,” Nagel and Dubowitz stressed.
“Indeed, the supreme leader understands what many Western politicians and commentators do not — that Pezekshian is a regime loyalist before anything else. What we are witnessing is another honeytrap like the one laid a decade ago, when President Hassan Rouhani and his Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, both wolves in sheep’s clothing, successfully negotiated a nuclear deal with sunset clauses that allowed for the rapid expansion and weaponization of their nuclear program after 2030.”
They added: “Western leaders pretended that this wouldn’t matter because the Islamic Republic would be moderate by then. Western leaders cannot make the same mistake again.”
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