The nuclear deal with Iran could strike a heavy personal blow to Netanyahu, leaving him at odds with the worldwide community and with few options for scuttling an agreement he has spent years trying to prevent.
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A day later, world leaders are starting to fire back with surprising openness, lashing Netanyahu for his insincerity.
France’s foreign minister said he will also visit Iran, though did not specify when.
As the freshly-inked deal was put to members of the UN Security Council, a combative Mr Obama said opponents at home and overseas had offered only a path to war.
Obama also addressed the concerns of Saudi Arabia and other Sunni Gulf states that the accord legitimises what they see as Iranian interference in the oil-rich region.
Downing Street said the leaders “welcomed the historic deal and underlined their respective commitments to delivering on it”.
As with regard to Tehran-London relations, President Rouhani said, ‘ We favor bilateral relations based on mutual respect and we think that they have the needed capacities for reconstruction of Iran-Britain relations.’.
“Well, that’s wrong, too”, Obama said adding that with this deal, USA will have unprecedented, 24/7 monitoring of Iran’s key nuclear facilities.
Netanyahu has been at the forefront of global opposition to the nuclear deal and has openly clashed with the Obama administration and other global powers that negotiated the deal, which lifts sanctions in return for greater restrictions on its nuclear programme. The Prime Minister made clear that he remained committed to reopening the British embassy in Tehran and they agreed that foreign ministers should continue to work together to resolve the outstanding issues before this can happen. He explained that, while Washington is cooperating with the Iraqi government on regaining territories lost to the Islamic State group (ISIS), it does not shy away from telling Baghdad that military cooperation with Iran is wrong.
Khamenei said Iran and the USA follow sharply different policies in the Middle East, making more a wide-ranging agreement unlikely.
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With Congress due to begin a 60-day review of the Iran deal, Republicans hope that misgivings expressed earlier by top Pentagon officials when the arms embargo issue was still under negotiation would give them further leverage with Democrats.
