(JTA) — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took to the American airwaves to criticize the framework agreement between Iran and the world powers on Iran’s nuclear program.
Netanyahu appeared on Sunday morning news programs on ABC, NBC and CNN.
“The entire world celebrated the deal with North Korea. It deemed to be a great breakthrough; it would bring an end to North Korea’s nuclear program; you’d have inspectors. That would do the job. And of course everybody applauded it, but it turned out to be a very, very bad deal and you know where we are with North Korea,” Netanyahu told NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
“I think the same thing would be true in the case of Iran, except that Iran is a great deal more dangerous than North Korea. It’s a militant Islamic power bent on regional domination — in fact, bent on world domination, as it openly says so. They just chanted ‘Death to America’ a few days ago on the streets of Tehran, the same streets where they’re rejoicing right now.
“Don’t give the preeminent terrorist state of our time the access to a nuclear program that could help them make nuclear weapons. It’s very bad for all of us,” Netanyahu said.
Netanyahu told CNN that under the deal, Iran’s nuclear infrastructure will remain in place, with “not a single centrifuge destroyed, not a single nuclear facility shut down, including the underground facilities that they built illicitly. Thousands of centrifuges will keep spinning, enriching uranium. That’s a very bad deal.
“They’re getting a free path to the bomb,” Netanyahu said.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), who is Jewish, told CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday morning that the agreement does not threaten Israel’s survival and that Netanyahu should “contain himself because he has put out no real alternative. In his speech to the Congress — no real alternative. Since then — no real alternative.”
Feinstein said his public criticism of the framework agreement and attempts to turn the public against it was doing great harm.
“This can backfire on him,” she said.
