Israel and the United States have signed a joint memorandum for cooperation in dealing with the Iranian nuclear threat, Barak Ravid of Israel’s Channel 10 and Axios reported.
The document was reportedly signed at the White House on December 12 following extensive talks with several intelligence officials and lead by national security adviser’s H. R. McMaster and Meir Ben-Shabbat.
According to the report, the plan laid out the “steps on the ground” the position that President Trump talked about in his October 13 speech where he decertified the Iran nuclear deal and asked Congress to work on new measures to deal with the Iranian threat without destroying the Iranian nuclear deal.
“We cannot and will not make this certification,” Trump said during the speech. “We will not continue down a path whose predictable conclusion is more violence, more terror and the very real threat of Iran’s nuclear breakout.”
Joint teams were set up to handle the Iranian threat.
One team is tasked with dealing with countering Iran in Syria as well as their support for Hezbollah and other terror groups. The team will also draft a joint policy in regards to “the day after” in the Syrian civil war, Axios reported.
A second team will handle diplomatic and intelligence activities that will monitor and verify that Iran is not violating the Iran nuclear deal. They also handle diplomatic steps to put pressure on Iran.
The third team would counter Iran’s ballistic missile program and its intentions to build precision guided missiles in Syria and Lebanon that would be used against Israel in the future.
The final team would prepare for an escalation by Iran or Hezbollah.
Quoting an Israeli official, Axios and Channel 10 reported,
“The U.S. and Israel see eye to eye the different developments in the region and especially those that are connected to Iran. We reached at understandings regarding the strategy and the policy needed to counter Iran. Our understandings deal with the overall strategy but also with concrete goals, way of action and the means which need to be used to get obtain those goals.”
