Israel opposes any and all versions of Iran Deal, says PMO – exclusive

Israel opposes any return to the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, contrary to the impression recent statements may have given, a senior Prime Minister’s Office official told The Jerusalem Post on Wednesday.

“Israel is unequivocal that under no circumstances should there be a return to that bad deal,” the official said.

The remarks came less than a week after AFP published an interview with Israeli Ambassador to Germany Jeremy Issacharoff with the headline: “Israel open to German efforts to expand Iran nuclear deal with more restrictions.”

In the AFP article, Issacharoff said that German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas’s call to reassess the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, as the Iran deal is known, is a “step in the right direction.”

The senior Prime Minister’s Office official said Issacharoff’s remarks were misinterpreted and sought to make amply clear that Israel’s position is that the JCPOA is unacceptable, even with changes.

“In contrast to the impression given in the interview with the Israeli ambassador in Germany,” the official said, “Israel firmly believes that there should be no return to the Iran nuclear agreement of 2015 – a deal which is flawed to its foundations.”

The official argued that the “deal gave Iran a highway paved with gold to build the critical infrastructure for an entire arsenal of nuclear bombs. That deal gave Iran the resources to significantly escalate its aggression and terror across the Middle East.”

The US, under President Donald Trump, left the Iran deal in 2018, in favor of a “maximum pressure” sanctions regime against the ayatollahs’ regime.

US President-elect Joe Biden has said that he seeks to return to the JCPOA, along with Iran resuming strict compliance to its terms. Then, he would work with US allies “to strengthen and extend it, while more effectively pushing back against Iran’s other destabilizing activities.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, however, has repeatedly and publicly warned against a return to the deal.

In November, Netanyahu said: “Do not return to the previous [Iran] nuclear deal. We must keep to an uncompromising policy to ensure that Iran does not develop nuclear weapons.”

Maas told Der Spiegel this month that the JCPOA needed to be turned into a “nuclear agreement plus” that would also restrict Iran’s ballistic missile program and proxy warfare throughout the Middle East.agreement.”