Don't fall for Iran's charm offensive, Netanyahu warns

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu played the spoiler to Iran's attempts to ease relations with the West, calling the Iranian leader "a wolf in sheep's clothing" and declaring that Israel will do whatever it takes to prevent Tehran from developing nuclear weapons, even if it has to stand alone.

Speaking to world leaders at the UN General Assembly on Tuesday, Netanyahu gave a point-by-point rebuttal of President Hassan Rowhani's speech last week signalling a willingness to discuss Iran's disputed nuclear programme.

Accusing Rowhani of a "charm offensive" aimed at getting the West to lift crippling sanctions, Netanyahu portrayed him as "a loyal servant of the regime" who has done nothing to stop his country's nuclear programme since he took office in June.

Rowhani, he added, must have known about terrorist attacks carried out by Iranian agents in Argentina, Saudi Arabia and Berlin in the 1990s because he was national security adviser at the time.

Israel's hope for the future is challenged "by a nuclear-armed Iran that seeks our destruction", the Israeli leader said.

A year ago at the General Assembly, Netanyahu held up a drawing of a spherical bomb with a sputtering fuse, then pulled out a red marker and drew a line across what he said was the threshold Iran was fast approaching and which Israel would not tolerate - 90 per cent of the uranium enrichment needed to make an atomic bomb.