Iran's Nuclear Chief warns Israel to 'check' its capabilities before issuing threats

In an interview with Al-Masirah on Saturday, Mohammad Eslami, Iran's Atomic Energy Organization chief, advised Tel Aviv to examine its own capabilities before issuing threats. Before Eslami, Ali Shamkhani, the secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council had warned Israel last month that if the nation attacks the Islamic Republic, it will face severe economic consequences.

The Israeli government approved a budget of 5 billion shekels (about $1.5 billion) to prepare for a future strike on Iran's nuclear facilities, with the money reportedly going toward aircraft and intelligence-gathering drones, as well as specialised armaments for strikes on heavily fortified underground facilities, according to Israeli media last month.

Shamkhani tweeted, "Instead of allocating [a] $1.5 billion budget for atrocities against Iran, the Zionist regime should focus on providing tens of thousands of billions of dollars [in] funding to repair the damage that is going to be caused by Iran's shocking response."

Eslami's comments came as Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Naftali Bennett said the Jewish state is extremely concerned about the possibility of world powers lifting anti-Iran sanctions in exchange for insufficient restrictions on Tehran's nuclear programme. Bennett, according to Sputnik, told a cabinet meeting on Saturday that "this is the message that we are relaying in every manner, whether to the Americans or to the other countries negotiating with Iran."

The remarks came in response to a Wall Street Journal report that the US is considering a less-for-less nuclear deal with Iran, in which the US would grant partial sanctions relief in exchange for a rollback or halt on nuclear activities in the Islamic Republic.

Vienna Nuclear Talks to resume on Nov. 29

While American officials have described such a deal as the result of brainstorming, Tel Aviv has asserted that a partial agreement with Iran would be a gift to Iran's new government led by Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi. In May 2018, then-US President Donald Trump unilaterally exited the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), widely known as the Iran nuclear deal, and reimposed devastating economic sanctions on Iran.

A year later, Tehran claimed that it had begun to withdraw from its JCPOA commitments, particularly those pertaining to uranium enrichment. Negotiations to resurrect the deal began in April, following the election of US Vice President Joe Biden, but halted in June, when Raisi was elected. Both parties have since reaffirmed that talks on sanctions and the nuclear accord will restart in Vienna on November 29.

(With inputs from agencies)

Image: AP