Netanyahu Vows to Prevent Iran from Obtaining Nuclear Weapons

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to prevent Iran from possessing nuclear weapons. Speaking at a public event in Tel Aviv on Sunday (21/6) local time, Netanyahu reaffirmed that the Middle East war has achieved Israel’s primary objective of stopping Iran from obtaining a nuclear bomb. “We prevented Iran from carrying out its plan to destroy us, and by now they should have had an atomic bomb to do it,” he said, as reported by AFP news agency on Monday (22/6/2026). “We prevented that from happening. We removed an existential danger. Had we not acted… Iran would have had an atomic bomb and, let me tell you something, they would have used it,” he stated. “That is what we prevented,” he added. Netanyahu said the joint US-Israeli strikes had dealt a severe blow to Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, which may “not recover for a long time”. “Because once you deliver these blows and once the rift between the regime and the people is so deep, you cannot say when such a regime will fall,” Netanyahu said. “I think we have created the conditions for that regime to fall. That will be the true victory, when the Iranian people take control of their own destiny and remove the brutal regime that terrorises them and terrorises the entire world,” the Israeli leader added. Netanyahu also confirmed that Israeli forces will remain in southern Lebanon “as long as necessary”. “We will remain in the security zone in southern Lebanon for as long as necessary to protect our beloved northern residents and all Israeli citizens… Nothing will change that commitment,” Netanyahu said. He also stated that Israeli forces are targeting the militant group Hezbollah in Lebanon while seeking to minimise civilian casualties. “There are some civilian casualties in every such war, in every such urban war,” Netanyahu remarked. He stressed that Israel is at war with Hezbollah, not Lebanon. “When that Iranian proxy is no longer a threat, when it is disbanded, when it is disarmed, yes, we will make peace with Lebanon, and I look forward to signing it,” he said. Hezbollah dragged Lebanon into the Middle East war in early March, when the Iran-backed militant group fired rockets into Israel in retaliation for the killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in a US-Israeli strike.