Israeli Prime Minister Yair Lapid handed over "sensitive and relevant" information on the Iranian nuclear program to German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Monday.
"Our good relationship obliges us to act jointly against the growing threat posed by Iran becoming a nuclear power (...). I have presented the chancellor with sensitive and relevant intelligence information on this issue," Lapid explained from Berlin, where he is on an official visit.
"As always in our close relationship with Germany, he has given us his full attention and full cooperation," the Israeli leader said at the press conference, a transcript of which was released by the Israeli government.
Lapid appreciated the joint statement issued this weekend by Germany, France and the United Kingdom in which they expressed their "serious doubts" about Iran's intention to reach a nuclear agreement after 18 months of negotiations.
"It is time to turn the page after the failed negotiations with Iran. They cannot and will not achieve the goal we all share, to prevent Iran from getting a nuclear weapon," Lapid said. To that end, he discussed with Scholz "the need for a new strategy to stop Iran's nuclear program."
"A nuclear Iran would destabilize the Middle East and provoke an arms race that would endanger the entire world," added the Iranian leader. Moreover, for Lapid, "to return to the nuclear agreement under the current conditions would be a blunder".
"Withdrawing sanctions and showering billions of dollars on Iran will provoke waves of terrorism, not only in the Middle East. Across Europe as well," he argued.
For Lapid "there is no other path" than that of the Abraham Accords and the Negev Forum, "a path based on a shared vision of the region, a vision that is not of war, extremism and terrorism, but of peace, tolerance and cooperation."