JERUSALEM: US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta arrived in Israel on Tuesday for talks to share information on Iran’s nuclear program, although he said there would be no discussion about “potential attack plans.”
“We have in the past and we’ll continue to discuss the situation with regards to Iran and the threat that it poses in the region,” the Pentagon chief told a news conference in Cairo before flying to Jerusalem.
“I think it’s the wrong characterization to say that we’re going to be discussing potential attack plans. What we are discussing are various contingencies on how we would respond,” said Panetta.
The Israeli daily Haaretz reported Sunday that US National Security Adviser Tom Donilon had recently briefed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on contingency plans for a pre-emptive strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities.
But an Israeli official, speaking on condition of anonymity, denied the report.
Echoing the position held for months by the United States, the defense secretary said Washington was continuing to “work on a number of options in that area,” although he did not specify.
Panetta said he plans to update Israel on “the situation with regards to Iran and the threat that it poses in the region” in talks with Netanyahu, President Shimon Peres, and his Israeli counterpart Ehud Barak.
The Pentagon chief said on Monday that sanctions were having a “serious impact” on the Iranian economy, even if their results may not be immediately obvious.
Speaking in Tunisia at the start of a Middle East tour that will also take him to Jordan, he said: “What we all need to do is to continue the pressure economically and diplomatically.”
During his visit to Israel, Panetta will also discuss the situation in Syria and visit a battery of the “Iron Dome” missile defense system that protects the Jewish state from rockets fired by Islamist militants from Gaza and Lebanon.
The United States contributes to the financing of the Iron Dome system, and pledged another $70 million in May, having already provided $205 million to the project.
A major ally of Washington, Israel receives about $3 billion in US military aid each year.
By sending the Pentagon chief to Jerusalem, the administration of President Barack Obama also appears to be keen to send a message back home, as his trip comes just two days after White House hopeful Mitt Romney visited Israel.
On Friday, Obama signed a law reinforcing US security and military cooperation with Israel surrounded in the Oval Office by representatives of the pro-Israel lobby AIPAC.