U.S., Iran Edge Toward Nuclear Deal as Israel Warns It Cedes Too Much to Tehran

Mr. Lapid has until recently taken a careful approach in public comments about the deal and pledged not to lobby the U.S. against its revival. But in his strongest public comments against the deal since coming to office in July, he accused the U.S. and its European allies of shifting their negotiating red lines to prevent the talks from collapsing.

“Israel is not against any agreement. We are against this agreement, because it is a bad one,” Mr. Lapid said. “In our eyes, it does not meet the standards set by President Biden himself: preventing Iran from becoming a nuclear state.”

The U.S., Iran and other participants in the 2015 deal are seeking to agree on the steps that Tehran and Washington would take to return to compliance with the nuclear agreement.

The U.S. withdrew from it in 2018 and Tehran started to expand its nuclear program a year later. Iran says its nuclear activity is for purely civilian purposes and the Biden administration has set restoring the agreement as a key foreign-policy goal.

Talks to do so have dragged on for close to 17 months and neared collapse at several points. But since negotiations in Vienna early this month, Western and Iranian officials have said some of the final obstacles have been removed.

In recent days, officials in Tehran and Washington have also started to sell the benefits of the deal to domestic audiences.

Israel remains opposed, saying nuclear weapons in the hands of its longtime foe Iran would be an existential threat. With the window closing for Israel to influence the U.S. decision, Israeli national security adviser

Eyal Hulata

met with his U.S. counterpart,

Jake Sullivan,

at the White House on Tuesday. Israeli Defense Minister

Benny Gantz

is slated to…