Israel warned yesterday that Iran could produce a nuclear warhead within ten weeks as Ebrahim Raisi, a hardline judge known as the “butcher of Tehran”, was sworn in as president.
Raisi, 60, took the oath of office in front of MPs, regional leaders and foreign dignitaries, as well as senior figures from militant groups including Hamas and Hezbollah.
In his first speech as president he said the “power of the Islamic Republic in the region brings about security” but that force would be used only against “threats made by dominating powers and tyrants”.
He insisted that Iran was not attempting to create “forbidden” nuclear weapons, despite suggestions by Israel that it was “about ten weeks away” from acquiring the materials for a warhead.
Benny Gantz, Israel’s defence minister, said his country was ready to take military action against Tehran after a series of attacks on shipping in the Gulf of Oman.
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“Now is the time for deeds — words are not enough. It is time for diplomatic, economic, and even military deeds, otherwise the attacks will continue,” he told the news website Ynet.
Israel has long regarded Iran’s civilian nuclear programme as a front for developing weapons. Israel’s spy agency, Mossad, is suspected of attacks on enrichment facilities and the assassination of a leading scientist in Tehran last November. Iran rejects such claims about its nuclear ambitions.
Speaking at the Majlis, Iran’s parliament, Raisi insisted that the nuclear programme was “completely peaceful” and said that “foreign pressure and sanctions will not cause the nation of Iran to back down from following up on its legal rights”.
Referring to an edict by Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, he added: “Nuclear weapons, as per the leader’s fatwa, is haram [forbidden].”
In remarks that suggested he could return to a landmark nuclear non-proliferation deal signed with world powers in 2015, he voiced support for “any diplomatic plan” that could lift the American sanctions that have hobbled Iran’s economy and prevented it from exporting oil in the past three years. Donald Trump tore up the nuclear deal as president in 2018, reimposing hundreds of sanctions on key industries and individuals in Iran, including Raisi.
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Iran has since violated its own side of the bargain by ramping up production of enriched uranium, the raw material for a weapon.
America urged Raisi to return to talks. “Our message to President Raisi is the same as our message to his predecessors . . . the US will defend and advance our national security interests and those of our partners. We hope that Iran seizes the opportunity now to advance diplomatic solutions,” a State Department spokesman said.
“We urge Iran to return to the negotiations soon so that we can seek to conclude our work,” he added.
Britain and other countries have been mediating talks since April to restore the deal, signed by Raisi’s more moderate predecessor, Hassan Rouhani, but negotiations stalled due to the Iranian election.
“The sanctions must be lifted,” Raisi said. “We will support any diplomatic plan that supports this goal.”
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A former head of the judiciary, he has been a firebrand member of Iran’s theocratic establishment since the 1979 revolution. He is accused of ordering the mass executions of political prisoners in the 1980s, among other abuses.
He takes power days after Iran was accused by Britain, Israel and the US of a drone attack on an unarmed oil tanker, the Mercer Street, off the coast of Oman. Britain promised a “concerted response” to the attack, in which an army veteran, Adrian Underwood, and a Romanian crew member were killed.
On Tuesday armed Iranian naval commandos were alleged to have boarded and temporarily hijacked another tanker, the Asphalt Princess, 65 miles from Fujairah, in the United Arab Emirates, and attempted to divert it to Iran. They were thwarted when the crew disabled the ship’s engines. Iran has denied responsibility.
Before the ceremony Raisi met President Ghani of Afghanistan, telling him that regional security should be solely maintained by nearby countries, a veiled reference to the withdrawal of US troops from Afghanistan.
President Salih of Iraq was among more than 200 guests at the inauguration, along with envoys from the Vatican and the European Union. Mixing with them were representatives of Iranian-backed militant groups in Gaza, Yemen and Lebanon, who have been accused of numerous atrocities. Sitting in the front row was Ismail Haniyeh, the political leader of Hamas.
