SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT
NEW YORK - The United States plans to implement a series of steps directed at Iran, in an effort to avert an Israeli strike and to push Tehran to taken nuclear talks more seriously, The New York Times reported Monday.
The steps include naval exercises and new antimissile systems in the Persian Gulf, as well as a harsher clamp down on Iranian oil revenue, the newspaper said in a dispatch.
The move by the Obama administration comes as Israel openly debates whether to strike Iran’s nuclear facilities in the coming months. Iran has consistently maintained that it’s nuclear facilities are geared towards peaceful purpose, not weapon-oriented.
“The Obama administration is moving ahead with a range of steps short of war that it hopes will forestall an Israeli attack, while forcing the Iranians to take more seriously negotiations that are all but stalemated,” it said.
“The administration is also considering new declarations by President (Barack) Obama about what might bring about American military action, as well as covert activities that have been previously considered and rejected.”
Citing unnamed military officials, the Times said the United States and more than 25 other countries will this month hold the largest-ever mine-sweeping exercise in the Gulf in what is seen as a bid to prevent Iran from trying to block oil exports through the Strait of Hormuz.
The US is also completing a new radar system in Qatar that would combine with radars already in place in Israel and Turkey to form a broad arc of antimissile coverage, the report said.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) said last week that Iran has doubled its uranium enrichment capacity at the underground Fordo facility in spite of UN Security Council resolutions, sanctions and talk of Israeli military action.
The UN nuclear watchdog also said its ability to inspect the Parchin military base, where it suspects Iran conducted nuclear weapons research in the past, has been “significantly hampered” by a suspected clean-up.
With these developments in mind, the US and Israeli intelligence agencies are debating possible successors to “Olympic Games,” the covert cyberoperation that infected Iran’s nuclear centrifuges with a computer virus and sent them spinning out of control, The Times said.
The Obama administration hopes that ramping up measures on Tehran will give Israel a way to back off from a military attack, which would almost certainly unleash a new conflict in the Middle East, the paper reported.
On Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu accused the international community of failing to draw a “clear red line” for Iran over its nuclear programme.
“Iran doesn’t see determination from the international community to stop its nuclear programme,” he said.