Iran steps up nuclear warhead work, Israel media report

In broadcast remarks from Sunday's weekly cabinet meeting, Netanyahu said: "There is a significant improvement in our abilities to defend the home front - in Iron Dome, in Arrow (missile defense systems), in defense, in shelters, in alerts and other things as well. But it is impossible to say that there are no problems in this field because there always are. But all the threats aimed today against the Israeli home front are dwarfed in the face of another threat, different in its scale, different in its essence. Therefore, I have repeated, and I repeat, that Iran must not get nuclear weaponry."

Citing an unnamed senior Israeli official, Haaretz said a new National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) compiled by the Obama administration included a "last-minute update" about significant Iranian progress in the development of a nuclear warhead "far beyond the scope known" to U.N. inspectors.

Israel Hayom reported NIE findings that Iran had "boosted efforts" to advance its nuclear programme, including work to develop ballistic missile warheads, and said U.S. and Israeli assessments largely tallied on this intelligence.

Neither daily newspaper provided direct quotes or detailed evidence. For Haaretz, it was the second report since Thursday (August 9) purporting to draw on a new NIE.

The Israeli government has yet to make its official comment.

Washington has not commented on whether such an NIE exists. But its officials say the U.S. intelligence assessment remains that the Islamic republic is undecided on whether to build a bomb and is years away from any such nuclear capability.

Asked about the reports ahead of the weekly cabinet meeting, Israeli Science and Technology minister Daniel Hershokovitz said that the sanctions imposed on Iran don't seem to work.

"Quite clear, Iran is very close to nuclear weapons and this is consistent with what i've said for a long time that those sanctions that are being operated against Iran won't really help," he said.

Israeli Finance minister Yuval Steinitz criticized what he saw as the "reckless" public discussion on a sensitive security issue.

"I think that the debate on this sensitive security issue of Iran - yes or no (to attack) - is impossible. I don't remember this kind of debate on such a sensitive issue, a public debate of this kind, with details, with leaks - in the history of the state of Israel. It is a debate that might damage the country's security and I think that one day we will have to check ourselves and see how we deteriorated to such a situation in which there's a public media debate so exposed, so reckless on such a sensitive issue," Steinitz said.

Israel, widely reputed to have the region's sole atomic arsenal, sees a nuclear-armed Iran as a mortal menace and has long threatened to attack its arch-foe preemptively.

The war talk is meant, in part, to stiffen sanctions on Tehran by conflict-wary world powers. Israel and the United States have publicly sought to play down their differences.

Much of the media scrutiny has been on opposition to the war option within the Israeli cabinet, military and public, given the tactical and strategic risks involved. But opinion polls suggest support for an attack is growing.

In downtown Jerusalem, citizens voiced mixed feelings regarding a possible imminent attack against Iran as they read the morning newspapers.

"I'm confused. Everyone is talking what's gonna happen if we will attack Iran but nobody is discussing and talking what would happen if we would not attack Iran. What will be the consequences if we are not gonna attack? How are we gonna live in a Middle East and live in a world that one of the largest islamic extreme government is gonna have control over atomic bomb," said Erez Goldman.

"We have to really really really, really, really be careful and try everything but not going into action that will lead to nobody knows where but it can be really catastrophic event for the whole world," said Rakefet ben Neriya.

Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper suggested on Friday (August 10) that a destabilising Israeli attack on Iran before November could undermine Obama, a Democrat whose ties with Netanyahu have been testy, and help Republican rival Mitt Romney, who casts himself as a better friend of the Jewish state.

But a senior Israeli official quoted in a separate Haaretz story spoke of the question of who would head the next U.S. administration as largely irrelevant regarding Iran given Israel's belief that "we cannot place our fate in the hands of others" and "in statesmanship there are no future contracts".

That official was described by Haaretz as a "decision-maker" and veteran security figure who owns a grand piano - strong signals it was Ehud Barak, Israel's longtime, centrist defence minister. Ex-general Barak is also an accomplished pianist who has recently briefed media in his Tel Aviv penthouse.

Though the Obama administration has refused to rule out a U.S. war of last resort to deny Iran the means to make a bomb, the Israeli official quoted by Haaretz said "expectation of such a binding American assurance now is not serious".