IDF Chief of Staff: Keep up pressure on Iran, don’t return to nuke deal

IDF Chief of Staff Aviv Kochavi warned the Biden Administration not to return to the 2015 Iran Nuclear deal in an address to the Institute for National Security Studies (NSS) Tuesday.

“I would like to clarify my position regarding the JCPOA”, he said, “Even if an improved agreement is reached, it will be a bad agreement at the operational and strategic level. Therefore, such an agreement must not be enable”

“If the 2015 nuclear deal had been implemented, Iran eventually would have been able to construct a bomb, because the agreement did not include restrictions and oversight to prevent it. Anything similar to the current agreement or even an improved agreement would be unacceptable and should not be allowed,” he said.

“Iran is not only a threat to Israel, it is a threat to the entire world. If the Iran deal of 2015 had materialized, ultimately Iran could have obtained a bomb. The Iran of today is not the Iran of 2015 when the JCPOA was signed,” Kochavi added.

Kochavi also addressed the threats facing Israel from the north and the south. “In the next war, we will alert populations in Lebanon and in Gaza the moment tensions begin that they must leave areas in which rockets and missiles are being stored,” he said,

“The enemy chose to entrench itself and its weapons, including missiles and rockets, in urban areas. They deliberately ignore international law; the clearest proof of this is that they intend to fire all these missiles toward Afula, Metula and Gush Dan. They have dispersed and decentralized all their networks, so it is imperative to adapt both the State of Israel, the IDF, and the international community to this reality.

“The changing nature of the battlefield requires changes of us as well. We must expose the capabilities of our enemies more effectively, and this is the essence of our multi-year plan,” he said,

He called on Hamas to return the Israeli soldiers and civilians currently being held in Gaza. “To the inhabitants of Gaza, I say that your quality of life can be vastly improved – but not until our missing soldiers are returned to us.”

He warned Israel’s citizens that should a war break out, many missiles and rockets would fall on Israel’s population centers. “This is an opportunity and an obligation for me to remind the citizens of the State of Israel as clearly as possible that on D-Day, during a war, many missiles and rockets will explode here and it won’t be easy.”

“In the face of these threats, we will respond with an extremely significant counterattack that will include targeting rockets, missiles and weapons, whether in open areas, or adjacent to and inside buildings,” Kochavi declared.