Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s government denounced world powers’ nuclear agreement with Iran on Sunday as a “bad deal” to which Israel would not be bound.
Yet Israeli officials stopped short of explicitly threatening military action that could further isolate the Jewish state and imperil its alliance with Washington, saying more time was needed to assess the accord.
“This is a bad deal. It grants Iran exactly what it wanted – both a significant easing in sanctions and preservation of the most significant parts of its nuclear programme,” an official in Netanyahu’s office said.
“The economic pressure on Iran could have brought about a much better deal which would have dismantled Iran’s nuclear capabilities.”
Aimed at ending a dangerous standoff, the agreement between Iran and the United States, France, Germany, Britain, China and Russia was nailed down after more than four days of negotiations in the Swiss city of Geneva.
