Only Iran nuclear dismantlement can prevent US attack

jpost.com · Feb 26, 2026 · Collected from GDELT

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ByJACOB NAGELFEBRUARY 26, 2026 19:36A crucial meeting took place in Geneva in what is being described as the ayatollah regime’s last opportunity to accept US President Donald Trump’s terms - or bear the consequences.The meeting was borne out of the pressure from the president’s very close advisers, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, along with several Arab states led by Qatar and Turkey, to give another chance to a political arrangement before turning to the military option.Meanwhile, speculation is intensifying over whether the United States will strike or continue negotiations - and if so, when the strike will begin, what form it will take, and what role Israel will play. Israel could possibly be asked to initiate a preliminary attack on the ballistic missile production facilities.Trump's State of the Union reveals deep deliberation over IranA close reading of Trump’s State of the Union address did not clarify the direction he intends to take - likely because he himself had not yet decided at the time of the speech. However, two key sentences from the address - one positive and one negative - reveal the president’s genuine deliberation regarding the next phase.The president stated that he has yet to hear from Khamenei the “magic words”: “We will never develop nuclear weapons.”US President Donald J. Trump delivers the first State of the Union address of his second term to a joint session of Congress in the House Chamber of the United States Capitol in Washington, DC, on Tuesday, February 24, 2026. (credit: Kenny Holston/Pool via REUTERS)Senior Iranian officials, including the supreme leader, have repeatedly declared, including recently, that their nuclear program is “for peaceful purposes” only. Such statements are meaningless to anyone who understands the concept of the fatwa, and the religious authorization to “lie” when the security of the Islamic Revolution is at stake.Moreover, merely stating that Iran does not intend to develop nuclear weapons, without explicit actions to dismantle its capabilities, is meaningless. The Iranian side interprets such a request as replacing the president’s confrontational rhetoric with negotiation rhetoric, a fatal mistake if true. Experience shows that entering negotiations with the Iranian regime will not guarantee non-nuclearization and would constitute a geopolitical failure for generations.On the other hand, Trump included the threat of long-range ballistic missiles as part of the Iranian current problem, despite Iran’s insistence, supported by some of the president’s advisers, on excluding the missiles from discussions.The president understands well, and was assisted in reaching this understanding, that public legitimacy and support from the American people for a broad strike on Iran must be based on a direct threat to the security of American citizens within the United States, not only to their bases in the Middle East.No doubt Iran possesses the knowledge and the technology to develop long-range ballistic missiles capable of threatening the United States, and it would not require too many years to operationalize this capability, if not stopped beforehand.The previous Israeli-American campaign destroyed significant portions of Iran’s nuclear infrastructure, ballistic missile systems and production facilities, and drone capabilities. However, Iran is now engaged in extensive reconstruction efforts. In the missile production infrastructure, it has already returned to its previous amounts, according to open-source reports.US must demand complete dismantlement of Iranian weaponsAccordingly, there can be only one demand in any future negotiation, should the United States mistakenly decide to enter them: a complete dismantlement of everything that remains, or has been rebuilt, in the nuclear sphere, ballistic missile programs, and drones, alongside an end to support for terrorism and repression of the Iranian people. There must be no further waste of time in diplomatic games and delay tactics, in which the Iranians excel.Iran’s top priority in the negotiations is lifting the crushing sanctions on its economy. Any agreement that provides sanctions relief and the injection of trillions of dollars into Iran would allow Khamenei and the Revolutionary Guards to silence domestic protests and use the funds until Trump leaves office, while simultaneously rebuilding terrorist networks, expanding missile arsenals (including long-range missiles capable of threatening the United States), and breaking out toward nuclear weapons after 2028.Entering such a process would endanger the United States, its regional forces, and its allies. It would also represent a continuation of the US president’s betrayal of the millions of Iranians who despise the regime and took to the streets awaiting the assistance Trump promised them, as well as the tens of thousands killed during the regime’s brutal suppression of protests.The ultimatum Trump previously issued must be repeated: “Accept the full terms of the United States, or face the consequences.”Alongside addressing the nuclear program, Washington must act to eliminate Iran’s long-range ballistic missile program, the primary future delivery system for nuclear weapons, and severely damage the regime’s internal repression apparatus, including the Revolutionary Guards, the Basij, the intelligence and the security services. Such action would restore deterrence and signal to the Iranian people that the American president’s promises of assistance are genuine.Iran’s defensive and offensive capabilities have been severely damaged, despite partial reconstruction since Operation Rising Lion, and Iran is at the weakest point it has ever been. The opportunity now facing the President of the United States and his allies is unique and must not be wasted.Israel’s position in negotiations prior to the nuclear agreement was clear: “Zero uranium enrichment, zero heavy-water reactors capable of producing plutonium, and zero fissile material on Iranian soil.”Now, following the activation of the snapback mechanism, Iran is obligated under UN Security Council resolutions to do exactly this: completely dismantle its nuclear facilities, remove all enriched materials, at every level, from Iran, cease all heavy-water and plutogenic reactor activities, fully halt work on weaponization, even if conducted under academic cover, and stop the development and production of ballistic missiles and support for terrorism. All of this must be under strict international supervision.The Iranian regime will likely not accept these conditions, though it will not state so explicitly, in order to enter endless negotiations. Only when the military option, which the United States has been preparing in recent weeks in coordination with Israel, becomes clearly real and imminent, is there a good chance of weakening the regime and renewing the protests. Only the Iranian people, suffering under a corrupt and cruel regime, are entitled and capable of replacing it.Brig.-Gen. (res.) Prof. Jacob Nagel is a Senior Fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies (FDD) and a professor at the Technion. He previously served as National Security Adviser to Prime Minister Netanyahu and as Acting Head of Israel’s National Security Council.