Israel will not accept a nuclear Iran, visiting Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said on Monday, ahead of his meeting with US President George W. Bush for talks focusing on Tehran's nuclear bid.
Speaking on US television, Olmert, while not ruling out military action, said he hoped diplomacy would dissuade Tehran from pursuing its nuclear program.
"We will not tolerate the possession of nuclear weapons by Iran," Olmert told NBC television's "Today Show" program.
Asked whether his country was considering a pre-emptive strike targeting Tehran's nuclear facilities, Olmert answered: "I hope we don't have to reach that stage."
But the Israel leader said his first choice is a negotiated resolution.
"Every compromise that will stop Iran from acquiring nuclear capabilities, which will be acceptable to President Bush, would be acceptable to me."
Asked what he believed to be the timeline for Iran developing possible nuclear weapons, Olmert responded, "it's a matter of, unfortunately, shorter time than most people think."
"I don't want to measure it in days or weeks, but it's quite close," he said.
Olmert added that he was not seeking Washington's protection from Tehran.
"I am not coming to the United States to ask America to save Israel," he said, saying his country had drawn the lessons of the Holocaust and World War II.
The Israeli leader added: "I am not looking for wars or confrontations. I am looking for the outcome," he said, adding that in his view the only result that matters is "whether it will succeed to stop Iran from possessing nuclear weapons."
Late Sunday, Olmert held preparatory talks with US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice ahead of the White House meeting, which comes less than a week after the midterm US elections which saw the Democrats wrest control of the US Congress from the Republicans.
Israeli officials told AFP the Bush-Olmert summit "was not meant to discuss specific policies, but rather offer the two leaders an opportunity to exchange views on current developments."
With Tehran continuing to reject international calls to halt its nuclear enrichment efforts, Israel has in recent months moved the Iranian threat to the top of its agenda.
On Sunday, Olmert reiterated Israel's position that Iran should be intimidated from the consequences of it completing its nuclear programme, which Israel, the US and European states claim is aimed at building an atomic bomb, despite Iranian claims it is meant for peaceful means only.
"Iran will not agree to make compromises if it is not afraid of the options it would face in the absence of a compromise," Olmert told reporters.
He hinted that "Israel has options which I am not ready to specify" against the Iranian nuclear programme, as Israeli officials refused to rule out military action on the Islamic republic.
Backed by the United States, Israel has said sanctions are necessary following Tehran's failure to suspend uranium enrichment.
Israel -- widely considered the Middle East's sole, if undeclared, nuclear weapons power -- considers Iran its chief enemy, pointing to calls from President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for the Jewish state to be wiped off the map.
An Iranian foreign ministry spokesman, Mohammad Ali Hosseini, said on Sunday that Tehran would deliver a "destructive" response to any Israeli military attack on its atomic sites and that it would continue trying to boost its capacity for uranium enrichment.
On the Palestinian front, the two leaders were expected to discuss their efforts to maintain pressure and the international boycott on the radical Hamas-led government.
Olmert said on Monday he was prepared to talk to a new Palestinian unity government including Hamas if the Islamists bow to international demands to recognise the Jewish state, renounce violence and abide by previous accords.
"If Hamas accepts the quartet conditions, I will sit down with them," Olmert said in a rare interview with the leading daily newspaper in the Palestinian territories, Al-Quds.
Olmert's comments appeared one day after feuding Palestinian factions agreed on a US-educated independent academic to head a unity cabinet, following five months of deadlock on finding a new administration to end a crippling boycott.