(Shutterstock)
By Lauren Marcus, World Israel News
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed grave reservations about a potential nuclear deal between the U.S. and Iran, claiming that if the terms of the deal are too lenient, such an agreement would be worse than not securing an agreement at all.
Netanyahu said he was concerned about the prospect of an agreement which would permit Iran to continue enriching uranium, albeit under the requirement of of doing so strictly for civilian purposes.
“A real deal that works is one that removes Iran’s capacity to enrich uranium for nuclear weapons,” Netanyahu said on Sunday, speaking at the Jewish News Syndicate conference in Jerusalem.
“A bad deal is worse than no deal,” he continued.
A weak deal could see Iran obey its terms for the duration of Trump’s term, then resume enriching uranium at nuclear-grade levels once the president leaves office, Netanyahu cautioned.
Therefore, Netanyahu said, the only deal that Israel “can live with” would require Iran to “dismantle all the infrastructure of” its nuclear program.
Netanyahu pointed to the 2003 nuclear deal with Libya, which saw the North African country shut down all of its nuclear assets and disband its nuclear research and development program.
The prime minister’s stance appeared to be at odds with President Donald Trump’s recent bombastic statements about the potential deal.
“On the Iran situation, I think we’re doing very well,” Trump said. “I think a deal is going to be made there.”
Trump added that Washington will establish an agreement with Tehran “without having to start dropping bombs all over the place.”
In an interview with Time last week, Trump denied claims that he had blocked an Israeli attack on Iran’s nuclear sites.
“Ultimately, I was going to leave that choice to them, but I said I would much prefer a deal than bombs being dropped,” he told the outlet.
In this photo released by the Iranian Presidency Office, smoke rises in the sky on April 27, 2025 after a massive explosion and fire rocked a port near the southern port city of Bandar Abbas, Iran, on Saturday. (Iranian Presidency Office via AP)
Firefighters in Iran are continuing to battle raging fires at the country’s largest commercial port, two days after a massive explosion killed at least 40 people, Iranian state TV reports.
The blast took place on Saturday at Shahid Rajaee Port in Iran’s south near the strategic Strait of Hormuz, a waterway through which one-fifth of global oil output passes.
It killed at least 40 people and injured more than 1,000 others, officials said, after triggering smaller explosions and fires in nearby containers.
Iran’s state TV shows images of firefighters dousing the flames, and said the damage will be assessed after the fire is fully brought under control.
Thick, swirling plumes of smoke rose over the stacked containers at the site, the TV images show.
It is not immediately clear what caused the explosion but the port’s customs office said it likely resulted from a fire that broke out at the hazardous and chemical materials storage depot.
An individual tied to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps reportedly confirmed the explosion occurred in a shipment from China of a chemical used to produce missile fuel.
