Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on Friday accused the international community of 'doing nothing' over Iran, likening the situation to the appeasement of the 1930s when faced with the rise of Nazism.
"Like the 1930s in Germany, the international community hears voices today calling for the destruction of Israel and does nothing," he said during a speech at the country's Holocaust memorial, Yad Vashem.
"For the first time, the leader of a great nation (Iran) declares that its objective is the destruction of the State of Israel, which does not stop this nation from remaining a legitimate partner in the UN," he added.
Israel views the Islamic republic as its chief enemy, alarmed by Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's call for the Jewish state to be wiped off the map and his dismissal of the Nazi Holocaust as a myth.
Olmert charged that Iran was not happy with words alone, "but is deploying huge efforts to acquire weapons of mass destruction".
He was speaking at a ceremony organised by Yad Vashem to honour US billionaire Sheldon Adelson, who donated 25 million dollars in what was the largest single private donation in the memorial's history.