Obama warns both Iran and Israel, 'I don't bluff'

President Barack Obama delivered his most explicit threat yet that the United States will attack Iran if that is what it takes to prevent the Islamic republic from developing a nuclear bomb. At the same time, he warned Israelis they would only make a bad situation worse if they moved pre-emptively against Iranian nuclear facilities.          

The double-barreled warning, in an interview published Friday, came before Obama's high-stakes meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Monday and a speech Sunday to the American-Israel Public Affairs Committee, a powerful pro-Israeli lobby. Obama said an Israeli strike would stir sympathy for Iran in a region where it has few allies. But he made clearer than before that Iran could face attack from the United States.          

"I think both the Iranian and the Israeli governments recognize that when the United States says it is unacceptable for Iran to have a nuclear weapon, we mean what we say," Obama told The Atlantic magazine. "I don't bluff."          

He said Iran and Israel both understand that "a military component" is among a mix of many options for dealing with Iran, along with sanctions and diplomacy, making plain a threat to attack that had previously been more subtly implied.          

The White House dispute with Israel is about the risks versus the benefits of a military strike in the near term, not whether one is ever appropriate. The issue is infused with domestic politics in both the United States and Israel, and Obama is at pains to show American Jewish voters that he is not being harder on Israel than on Iran.     

"Every single commitment I have made to the state of Israel and its security, I have kept," he said in the magazine interview. "Why is it that despite me never failing to support Israel on every single problem that they've had over the last three years, that there are still questions about that?"          

Israel has been publicly debating whether to launch air strikes on Iran's known nuclear facilities in the next several months, before Israel judges that Iran's program would be too far along to stop. The Obama administration argues that the time for a strike is further away, and that there remains enough time to persuade Iran's leaders to back down. Iran insists its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes.     

Israel wants U.S. backing for any military action against Iran but has signaled it would go it alone if need be. Israeli officials have said they have made no decision yet, but the Obama-Netanyahu meeting comes amid a growing sense in Israel and in Washington that a strike is likely.             

Netanyahu warned the world Friday not to fall into the "trap" of renewed nuclear talks. Speaking in Canada, the hawkish Israeli leader said he not would set down "red lines" for Israeli or U.S. action on Iran  a reference to reports in Israel that the country intended to press the United States to set such demands.             

An Israeli strike would be unlikely to eradicate the Iranian nuclear program, and would at best set it back a few years, the U.S. argument goes. In the end, the Iranian program could grow back stronger.        

Israel has refused to guarantee any notice to the U.S. ahead of time, a U.S. intelligence source told The Associated Press. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because much of the planning for Iran is classified. A pre-emptive Israeli strike probably would be similar to Israel's 1981 strike on an Iraqi weapons site that Israeli officials cite as a success.   

AP