Vice President Joe Biden warned Wednesday that the United States leaves open all options to take action against Iran for activity outside the nuclear deal, sharpening American concern after apparent back-to-back missile tests by Tehran.
The remarks by Biden came amid reports by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard of the test firings of two ballistic missiles with ranges capable of reaching Israel.
Similar Iranian tests claimed Tuesday brought threats of further sanctions by the United States, which already imposed some measures on Iran following other missile tests last year.
Iranian state televisions showed video purporting to show the test firings of the missiles, which the Revolutionary Guard said was part of the Iranian arsenal able to hit Israeli targets.
The tests appeared timed to coincide with Biden’s trip.
Iranian agencies had reported that the missiles tested on Wednesday were stamped with the message in Hebrew: “Israel should be wiped from the pages of history.”
Reported tests were seen has highly provocative by the West and its allies, and brought calls for further U.S. sanctions.
Biden said the United States “will act” if Iran violates the nuclear pact. He also said close watch will be kept on all Iranian programs outside the accord.]
“All their conventional activity outside the deal, which is still beyond the deal, we will and are attempting to act wherever we can find it,” he told reporters.
He repeated U.S. assurances that “a nuclear-armed Iran is an absolutely unacceptable threat to Israel, the region and the United States.”

Source: Washington Post, 9 March 2016