More sanctions are needed to stop Iran from attaining nuclear weapons, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said at the start of a meeting with US Special Representative for Iran Brian Hook on Tuesday. “I believe it’s time to implement snapback sanctions,” Netanyahu said. “I don’t think we can afford to wait. We should not wait for Iran to start its breakout to a nuclear weapon, because then it will be too late for sanctions.” The US envoy was in Israel as the two countries have been working closely together to extend the UN arms embargo on Iran, which expires on October 18. The embargo was part of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal. Though the US withdrew from the agreement in 2018, Trump administration officials, including Hook, have said the US would use its veto-proof “snapback sanctions” mechanism to extend the arms embargo indefinitely. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is expected to discuss the extension of the embargo in the UN Security Council later Tuesday. Hook said that Israel and the US “see eye to eye” on extending the arms embargo. “In four short months, Iran will be able to freely import fighter jets, attack helicopters, warships, submarines, large-caliber artillery systems and missiles of certain ranges,” Hook said. “Iran will then be in a position to export these weapons and their technologies to their proxies, such as Hezbollah, Palestine Islamic Jihad, Hamas, Shia militia groups in Iraq, Syria militant networks in Bahrain and to the Houthis in Yemen.” Hook mentioned his previous stops on his current Middle East trip, in Saudi Arabia, UAE and Bahrain, which have also called to extend the embargo. “Iran wants to be treated like a normal country,” Netanyahu said. “It should behave like a normal country [and not] deliberately deceive the international community. It lies all the time…It continues its secret program to develop nuclear weapons…Iran denies access to the IAEA inspectors to important sites, some of which we have uncovered through our own activities. It continues its rampant aggression across the Middle East and beyond that arms, trains, finances and dispatches terrorists.” Netanyahu lamented that “most of the international community is doing nothing,” and even worse, collude with Iran, and he thanked the US President Donald Trump and his administration for taking action. Netanyahu said Israel will continue to take steps against Iranian entrenchment in Syria and the region, as well as its nuclear ambitions. “I say to the ayatollahs in Tehran, Israel will continue to take the actions necessary to prevent you from creating another terror and military front against Israel in Syria, and I say to [Syrian President] Bashar Assad, you’re risking the future of your country and your regime,” he added. Netanyahu also referred to remarks by Alternative Prime Minister and Defense Minister Benny Gantz a day earlier that “whatever isn’t connected to fighting coronavirus will wait until after the virus, period.” “We have very important topics to discuss, even ones that can’t wait until after corona,” Netanyahu said.Source
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