Yechiel Leiter, Israel’s ambassador to the U.S., told a group of Jewish leaders on Wednesday that Iran must abandon its determination to annihilate the Jewish state and its people as part of any agreement, as the Trump administration prepares for talks with Iranian counterparts next week.
“The basis of any agreement pursued with Iran has to be: There is no more attempt to annihilate the Jewish State, the Jewish people,” Leiter told participants at The United for Security Emergency Leadership Mission.
His comments come after President Trump said he did not necessarily see a value in signing an agreement with Tehran over its nuclear program, but U.S. officials planned to meet with Iranian envoys this week.
Trump has given mixed messages on what he wants to achieve with Iran beyond preventing the country from obtaining a nuclear weapon. The president claims that the U.S. obliterated nuclear facilities it attacked in strikes last week, although early U.S. intelligence assessments suggest the program could be set back months. An Israeli assessment said the U.S. strikes coupled with Israeli military action set the program back a few years.
An agreement with Iran would likely try to force Tehran to agree to not restarting its nuclear program and giving up its pursuit of enriching uranium. Trump has not addressed whether talks with Iranian officials would also address its missile program and support for terrorist proxies — an important pillar for Israel.
Leiter’s comments add a potentially new demand to an agreement for Iran to abandon its goal of destruction of Israel, a key part of the Islamic Republic’s foreign policy doctrine. In addition to Iran’s targeting Israel directly and through proxies like Hezbollah in Lebanon, Hamas in the Gaza Strip and the Houthis in Yemen, Israeli citizens and Jews around the world have also been targets of terrorist attacks funded by the Iranian regime.
The ambassador, addressing a group of 400 Jewish leaders representing more than 100 Jewish communities and 50 national organizations, said the Middle East has the potential to change and that Israel was working toward expanding the Abraham Accords — the Trump-brokered agreement that established ties between Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.
“There’s no reason why we can’t have a Middle East, which is calm, quiet, cooperative, normalized and peaceful,” Leiter said.
The United for Security Emergency Leadership Mission was organized to advocate greater security for the Jewish community, following the murder of two Israeli embassy staff by a pro-Palestinian gunman in Washington D.C. last month.
“We are here to speak with one voice. We know there are many things on the nation’s agenda, but we must insist that the safety and security of the Jewish community and the battle against domestic terror be at the very top,” Jewish Federations CEO and President Eric Fingerhut told the crowd.
