TEL AVIV, April 17. /TASS/. Israel will not let Iran obtain nuclear weapons, the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in a statement.
"As the Prime Minister has made clear more than once: Israel will not allow Iran to obtain nuclear weapons," the statement reads. It emphasized that "for over a decade, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has led the global campaign against Iran's nuclear program, even when the threat was belittled and labelled ‘political spin,’ and the Prime Minister was called ‘paranoid.’"
According to the statement, earlier, Netanyahu "has led countless overt and covert operations in the campaign against Iran's nuclear program; it is only due to these operations that Iran does not currently possess a nuclear arsenal."
"These actions have delayed Iran's nuclear program by approximately a decade, thanks to Prime Minister Netanyahu's persistence in withstanding great opposition both at home and abroad to his vigorous policy toward Iran," the Israeli prime minister’s office insisted.
This statement appeared after earlier on April 17, the New York Times reported that Israel had planned to strike Iranian nuclear facilities in May but abandoned these plans because of lack of support from US President Donald Trump. According to the newspaper’s sources, Israel was "optimistic that the United States would sign off" and "defend Israel from Iranian retaliation." The goal was "to set back Tehran’s ability to develop a nuclear weapon by a year or more."