NEW YORK - Seconding the reaction of Israel and most of Iran’s Middle East neighbors, the World Jewish Congress expressed its deep misgivings after the announcement that the Western powers had secured an interim agreement in Geneva on limiting the Iranian nuclear program. “Iran must be judged by its actions, not its words and promises, because they are not worth the paper they are written on,” said World Jewish Congress President Ronald S. Lauder. “Nothing in the deceptive behavior of Iran and its leaders in recent years should make the world believe that they will honor this agreement.”
Lauder added that the WJC welcomed the preparedness of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and other leaders of the United States Congress to support a strengthening of Iran sanctions. In remarks before his weekly Cabinet meeting on Sunday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, "What was achieved last night in Geneva is not an historic agreement, but an historic mistake.”
“Today the world has become a much more dangerous place because the most dangerous regime in the world has taken a significant step toward attaining the most dangerous weapon in the world,” the prime minister added.
United Against a Nuclear Iran, a US lobbying group formed by former diplomats, criticized the Geneva deal as providing “disproportionate sanctions relief to Iran.”
"By not agreeing to dismantle a single centrifuge, Iran has not rolled back its nuclear infrastructure and with the many centrifuges that it is currently operating, Iran retains the ability to breakout and produce enough weapons-grade uranium for a nuclear weapon in as little as 2 months,” the group said in a statement. “At the same time, the carefully constructed sanctions architecture developed over decades has been significantly rolled back."
