Today, Iran’s foreign minister apparently negotiated indirectly with Steve Witkoff, Trump’s Middle East envoy, using an Omani official as a mediator to shuttle messages between the two. Iran also stated ahead of the negotiations that they want guarantees that Trump would not leave a new nuclear pact.  Since the meeting finished, Oman’s ministry of foreign affairs have said that both sides are working on a deal to maintain Iran’s capability of peaceful nuclear energy. Their statement said, “Their discussions aim to ensure Iran completely free of nuclear weapons and sanctions, and maintaining its ability to develop peaceful nuclear energy. It is only in dialogue and clear communication that we will be able to achieve a mutually credible agreement and understanding for the benefit of all concerned regionally and internationally”.  

This sounds ominously similar to the language of Obama’s nuclear deal signed in 2015. This deal allowed the Iranians to operate in bad faith and pull the wool over the eyes of the International Atomic Energy Agency and give Iran money to fund all of its proxies in the region. The first Trump administration exited the deal that Obama had made with Iran for good reason - although this did give Iran an excuse to charge ahead with its uranium enrichment program. 

Iran in Bible Prophecy

For years, Iran has been the head of an antisemitic octopus in the middle east, whose tentacles have been in every terrorist pie in the region - from Hezbollah, to the Houthis, to the Hamas fighters in Gaza. Iran’s nuclear threat has been looming over Israel and whole region for decades now. The bible describes a situation of peace in the land of Israel (and particularly the mountains of Israel), before a gathering of nations, headed by Russia, invade the land. Any change in Iran’s nuclear policy will have vast implications for Israel and their security. Ezekiel 38:5 tells us that Iran (or Persia), will be part of the later-day confederacy that invades the land of Israel. This means that we can expect Iran to remain hostile to the Jewish people. However, we also learn from Ezekiel 38:11-13 about the situation of peace on the mountains of Israel directly before this invasion takes place. It is hard to see how this can be possible without a wider peace in the region taking place. A wider peace in the region would be virtually impossible with an aggressive Iran that is armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons. Therefore, the issue of Iran’s nuclear program is of huge significance and interest when it comes to bible prophecy. 

How Close is Iran to Nuclear Weapons?

As far as any deal with Iran is concerned, the million dollar question is: How close is Iran to nuclear weapons already? Nowadays, the answer to this question is disturbing - they are not very away!
In order to attain nuclear weapons capability a country needs the following 2 things:
Firstly - enriched Uranium
Secondly - Components of a successful weapon that would be able to receive the processed Uraniu

1) Enriched Uranium.

Enriching Uranium involves taking natural Uranium and increasing the concentration of the Uranium-235 Isotope. This is usually done using a piece of equipment called a centrifuge. A centrifuge spins at high speeds to separate different isotopes of uranium. This is why news articles often talk about Iran’s centrifuges.  Enriched Uranium is a critical component for both civil nuclear power generation and Nuclear Weapons. 

Most Nuclear reactors used for power generation require uranium that is enriched to 3-4%. However, weapons grade uranium must be 85% enriched if not more. This is why it is so abundantly clear to the world that Iran is interested in much more than civil nuclear power generation. Iran have currently increased its enrichment activities to 60%. The United States and others now estimate that Iran could reach weapons-grade Uranium in a matter of weeks using the centrifuges on Iran’s Netanz Nuclear site. This timing (to reach weapons grade uranium) is often referred to in the press as Iran’s nuclear break-out time. Interestingly, in 2012, Netanyahu famously drew a red line on a graphic of a bomb at the UN, demonstrating when he would consider military action to be necessary. He drew the red line at 90% enrichment. Since that speech, the nuclear deal with America, the JCPOA, forced Iran to reduce its stockpile. However in recent years this has been built back up again. 90% enrichment has still not been reached but Iran is only a matter of weeks away. This is down to Iran’s choice, not a lack of capability, likely because they have not yet delivered a successful nuclear warhead.

2) Components of a successful weapon

This breakout time does not account for technological capability and time required to build a  workable nuclear warhead. According to the House of Commons Library, the time to develop a weapon like this, for Iran, is estimated to be around 1-2 years. However, the bottom line is that the information (at least in the public domain) is unclear as to the current Iranian expertise and research in this area. This time could easily be shorter than suggested. 

Summary

It is not possible to quantitively estimate how far away Iran are from Nuclear weapons. What we can say for sure is that qualitatively speaking they are really not far away!

Could Israel Strike Iran Anyway? 

Because of this, Israel might not be overjoyed with Trump and Steve Witkoff based their current negotiations. Leaving Iran with the capability of producing a workable nuclear weapon in just a few weeks doesn’t bode well for the security of the Jewish people. This is why the Times of Israel reported today that Israel are said to be mulling an attack on Iran nuclear sites despite Trump waving of the plan. Their military plans are said to include both air strikes and commando operations that vary in their severity. However, this could alienate Trump and risk the broader US-Israel alliance. 

In the next few weeks, we could see a shiny but ill-advised new nuclear deal, or an air strike on Iran - or perhaps neither of those things. But we do know that Ezekiel 38 demands a situation of peace in Israel somehow and Iran’s possible nuclear weapons massively impact this. Therefore, this should be a matter of major interest for all who believe the words of the ancient prophets of Israel as recorded in Scripture. 

Join us again next week for another edition of Bible in the News. This has been Daniel Blackburn joining you. 

Reference: https://www.iranwatch.org/our-publications/articles-reports/irans-nuclear-timetable-weapon-potential