Iran Threatens Israel If U.S. Attacks

A Revolutionary Guards commander said Tuesday that Israel would be Iran's first retaliatory target in response to any U.S. attack, a provocative threat that reinforced the Iranian president's past call for Israel to be "wiped off the map."

"We have announced that wherever (in Iran) America does make any mischief, the first place we target will be Israel," the Iranian Student News Agency quoted Gen. Mohammad Ebrahim Dehghani as saying.

Dehghani, a top commander of the elite Revolutionary Guards, also said Israel was not prepared to go to war against Iran.

"We will definitely resist ... U.S. B-52 (bombers)," Dehghani was quoted as saying.

On Tuesday, Israeli elder statesman Shimon Peres called on Iran to scrap its nuclear program and warned: "Remember that Israel is exceptionally strong and knows how to defend itself."

President Bush has said a military option remains on the table if Iran does not agree to international demands for it to stop enriching uranium and open its nuclear program to inspections. However, Bush said he wants to solve the dispute through diplomacy.

Dehghani, who served as a spokesman during Revolutionary Guards war games last month, said the exercises were held ahead of schedule to send a message to the U.S. and its allies against any plans for a military strike.

"We were due to organize the maneuvers in May but because of timing conditions and issues related to nuclear energy and upon the recommendation of Mr. Larijani, it was held 40 days sooner than planned," he said. Ali Larijani is Iran's top nuclear negotiator.

Friday marked the deadline set by the U.N. Security Council for Iran to freeze its uranium enrichment program. Council members are now considering the next steps, which could include punishing sanctions though Russia and China are on record as opposing that option.

"The Security Council will take up the issue of Iran on Wednesday," said CBS News foreign affairs analyst Pamela Falk from the U.N. "In an afternoon session on non-proliferation, and with elements of a draft resolution circulating, the real test of the U.N. will be if they can get achieve consensus on a resolution that is binding and holds out the possibility of later sanctions."

No vote is expected on a resolution until next week, Falk reports, but the negotiations are intense on how to word the resolution.

"The stakes are high," she said.

The semiofficial student news agency gave no further details on Dehghani's remarks or where he made them.

Israel's army chief, Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz, said in an interview published Tuesday that the world has the military might to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon. He also said that if Iran does obtain nuclear capability, it will constitute a threat to Israel's existence.

When asked if the world can, militarily, stop Iran's nuclear program, Halutz told the Maariv newspaper "Yes, yes. Regarding whether or not the world can, the answer is yes."

Questioned on whether Israel would be involved in such a military operation against its top enemy, Halutz said "We are part of the world."

Earlier Tuesday, Mohammad Ghannadi, deputy chief for nuclear research and technology, said Iran had found uranium ore at three newly discovered sites in the center of the country.

He also said Tehran was on schedule to start large-scale enrichment by the end of the year.

Both declarations appeared intended to reinforce Tehran's defiance of U.N. demands for a freeze on enrichment and full cooperation with the International Atomic Energy Agency which is trying to learn the parameters of the country's nuclear ambitions.

The U.S., Britain and France have said they fear Iran is using its civilian nuclear program for electricity generation as a cover for building nuclear weapons. Tehran denies the assertion.

"We have got good news: the discovery of new economically viable deposits of uranium in central Iran," Mohammad Ghannadi, deputy chief for nuclear research and technology, told a conference Tuesday.

"One is in Khoshoomi region in central Iran. Studies have already been made and samples have already been taken there. The other two are in Charchooleh and Narigan in central Iran," Ghannadi said.

Ghannadi also said Iran intended to move toward large-scale uranium enrichment involving 3,000 centrifuges in the underground cascade halls at Natanz, in central Iran, by late this year and would later expand the program to 54,000 centrifuges.

We are making good progress," he said.

Iran already has considerable uranium resources available for its nuclear program, a fact that called into question the importance of the newly announced discoveries, beyond their propaganda value.

In an exclusive interview with CBS News correspondent Elizabeth Palmer Monday, Dr. Ali Larijani – the head of Iran's national security council and the country's chief negotiator on nuclear issues – said now that Iran has succeeded in enriching uranium, there will be no turning back.

"This is a whole new ball game and requires a new solution," said Larijani, asked what incentives could be provided to persuade Iran to abandon its nuclear program. "We cannot insist on the solutions of the past."

Iran's principal source of uranium is the Saghand mine in the center of the country, which has the capacity to produce 132,000 tons of uranium ore per year and is said to be the biggest in the Middle East.

Ghannadi also said Iran's uranium enrichment program was continuing and confirmed reports that a few of centrifuges at the enrichment facility in Natanz failed last month and were replaced.

"It's not a problem," Ghannadi told a conference in this holy city south of Tehran.