Bennett To UN: Israel’s Tolerance At “Watershed Moment” As Iran Crossed All Nuclear “Red Lines”

Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett in his address to the UN General Assembly meeting in New York on Monday warned that Iran’s advancing nuclear program has caused Israel’s tolerance to hit a “watershed moment”. 

“Iran’s nuclear program has hit a watershed moment and so has our tolerance,” Bennett said. “Words do not stop centrifuges from spinning.” That’s when he emphasized, “All red lines have been crossed,” in an ominous tone of forewarning. 

He reiterated prior vows to never allow the Islamic Republic to achieve nuclear weapons capability – an assumption that leaders in Tehran have long disputed. Iran officially calls nuclear arms ‘unIslamic’ – according to pronouncements over the years by the Ayatollah.

But Bennet in his UN speech alleged that Iran is trying to expand its influence over the whole Mideast region via a “nuclear umbrella” through which it can flex its muscles and dictate its interests – for example in Yemen, Syria, Iraq and Lebanon.

“We will not tire. We will not allow Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon,” Bennet said further.

Interestingly, he appeared to lash out at US progressives – including the handful of Progressive Democrats in Congress (namely ‘the Squad’, which tried to strip an extra $1 billion from a defense bill last week intended to help replenish Israel’s ‘Iron Dome’ munitions) as well as companies which promote the BDS movement to boycott Israel in protest of its treatment of Palestinians:

“Attacking Israel doesn’t make you morally superior. Fighting the only democracy in the ME doesn’t make you woke. Adopting clichés about Israel without bothering to learn the basic facts, well, that’s just plain lazy.”

Words alone won’t stop centrifuges from spinning, but sanctions relief did. On the other hand, Israeli covert ops triggered an end to intrusive inspections, destroyed an IAEA monitoring camera and triggered 20% & 60% enrichment: https://t.co/lvV889KqUt

— Ryan Costello (@RyeCostello) September 27, 2021

The address follows last week’s statement by Iran’s foreign ministry which indicated Iran planned to return to Vienna negotiations for the restoration of the JCPOA nuclear deal “very soon”. 

Also last week for the first time new Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi addressed a global audience, telling the UNGA meeting via remote feed that Iran is ready and willing to continue Vienna negotiations toward a restored JCPOA nuclear deal, but that Washington must drop its sanctions that contravened the original 2015 deal.