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Netanyahu convenes Iran war drill, scorns UN nuclear watchdog

Yahoo! News, Dan Williams, Sun, 4 June 2023 

JERUSALEM (Reuters) -Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu ramped up threats to attack Iranian nuclear facilities on Sunday, convening a rare cabinet war drill after he accused U.N. inspectors of failing to confront Tehran.

With Iran having enriched enough uranium to 60% fissile purity for two nuclear bombs, if refined further – something it denies wanting or planning – Israel has redoubled threats to launch preemptive military strikes if international diplomacy fails. Israel has long maintained that for diplomacy to succeed, Iran must be faced with a credible military threat.

We are committed to acting against Iran’s nuclear (drive), against missile attacks on Israel and the possibility of these fronts joining up,” Netanyahu said in a video statement from Israel’s underground command bunker at its military headquarters in Tel Aviv.

The possibility of multiple fronts, Netanyahu said while surrounded by security cabinet ministers and defence chiefs, requires Israel’s leadership “consider, if possible consider ahead of time,” its major decisions.

Netanyahu’s office issued footage of the drill. The publicity around the preparations appeared to depart from Israel’s 1981 strike on an Iraqi nuclear reactor and a similar sortie in Syria in 2007, carried out without forewarning.

UN WATCHDOG SAID IRAN PROVIDED SATISFACTORY ANSWER

Earlier, Netanyahu levelled sharp criticism of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), following a report last week by the U.N. watchdog that Iran had provided a satisfactory answer on one case of suspect uranium particles and re-installed some monitoring equipment originally put in place under a now-defunct 2015 nuclear deal……….

The IAEA declined to comment.

On Wednesday, the agency reported that after years of investigation and lack of progress, Iran had given a satisfactory answer to explain one of three sites at which uranium particles had been detected.

Those particles could be explained by the presence of a onetime Soviet-operated mine and lab there and the IAEA had no further questions, a senior diplomat in Vienna said.

In an apparent reference to this, Netanyahu said Iran’s explanations were “technically impossible.”………………………more https://au.news.yahoo.com/israel-accuses-u-n-nuclear-125127358.html

June 6, 2023 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | Israel, weapons and war