CAUTION URGED

‘Israel will stand alone’

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu tells a U.N. gathering to beware of Iran’s pledge to strike a nuclear deal.

UNITED NATIONS — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu urged foreign dignitaries Tuesday to view Iran’s latest diplomatic charm offensive with distrust and warned that Israel would act alone, if necessary, to prevent Tehran from developing a nuclear weapon.

“Israel will never acquiesce to nuclear arms in the hands of a rogue regime that repeatedly promises to wipe us off the map,” Netanyahu said in an address at the U.N. General Assembly. “... Israel will not allow Iran to get nuclear weapons. If Israel is forced to stand alone, Israel will stand alone.”

Speaking just days after President Barack Obama’s historic phone call with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, Netanyahu appealed to the gathering to cast a skeptical eye on Iran’s pledge to strike a nuclear deal, saying that Tehran has repeatedly employed diplomatic outreach to disguise its plans to build a nuclear bomb.

He said that while Rouhani’s conciliatory rhetoric sets him apart from his confrontational predecessor, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, both men remain committed to developing a nuclear bomb.

“Now I know Rouhani doesn’t sound like Ahmadinejad,” Netanyahu said, “but when it comes to Iran’s nuclear weapons program, the only difference between them is this: Ahmadinejad was a wolf in wolf’s clothing: Rouhani is a wolf in sheep’s clothing, a wolf who thinks he can pull the wool over the eyes of the international community.”

An Iranian diplomat with Iran’s U.N. delegation, Khodadad Seifi, responded swiftly, warning that “the Israeli prime minister had better not even think about attacking Iran, let alone planning for that. “Iran’s centuries-old policy of nonaggression must not be interpreted as its inability to defend itself,” Seifi said.

Netanyahu’s remarks followed a week of diplomatic exchanges between the U.S. and Iran, including a meeting of foreign ministers that brought Secretary of State John Kerry and Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif together at U.N. headquarters to discuss Iran’s nuclear program. The flurry of exchanges culminated with Obama’s phone call Friday to Rouhani, marking the first direct conversation between U.S. and Iranian leaders in more than 30 years.