Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused the Iranian foreign minister of "lying" on Monday and said he would never "allow Iran to develop nuclear weapons that threaten our existence and endanger the entire world."
"Iran is the one that openly threatens, every day, to destroy the State of Israel. Iran continues to entrench itself militarily in Syria. And today, the IAEA reports that Iran is accelerating its nuclear program," Netanyahu added.
Recent weeks have seen U.S.-Iranian tensions sharply increase, a year after Washington ended its participation in the 2015 nuclear deal with Iran, saying it paved the way for Iran to acquire nuclear weapons.
The agreement, dating to the Obama administration, included the U.S., world powers and Iran, which ostensibly agreed to curb its nuclear program in exchange for the lifting of international financial sanctions.
Washington tightened sanctions from the start of May, ordering all countries and companies to halt all imports of Iranian oil or be banished from the global financial system. U.S. President Donald Trump said he would life the sanctions if Iran agreed to amend the nuclear deal and expand it significantly.
The U.S. has also begun discussing military confrontation, dispatching extra troops to the region to counter what it describes as Iranian threats.
Iran has responded with a threat to increase its enrichment of uranium, saying it was up to Europeans who still support the nuclear deal to save it by finding ways to ensure Tehran receives the economic benefits it was promised.
IAEA chief Yukiya Amano, whose agency is responsible for monitoring Iranian compliance with the nuclear deal, said Iran was now producing more enriched uranium than before, but it was not clear when it might reach stockpile limits set in the pact.
Iran said last month it was still abiding by the deal but would quadruple its production of enriched uranium – a move that could take it out of compliance if stockpiles rise too far. It demanded European countries do more to shield it from sanctions.
