Iran will never become a nuclear power, Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was quoted on Thursday as saying, as Iran's president was proclaiming his country the "most powerful nation" on earth.

"I can say... that, to my knowledge, and on the basis of what I know and read, I believe the efforts of the international community will succeed, and that Iran will not become a nuclear power," he told the Maariv daily.

"There is an enormous effort on the part of the international community to prevent Iran from becoming a nuclear country. Israel plays an important part in those efforts, without leading them."

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Building on that, and in an allusion to recent threats made against Iran by an Israel minister, Olmert added: "That is why Israel should not resort to threats as made recently."

Last week, Israeli National Infrastructure Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer warned that any Iranian attack against Israel "would lead to the destruction of the Iranian nation."

That prompted a response from the deputy commander of Iran's army, Mohammad Reza Ashtiani, that his country would "eliminate Israel from the global arena" if it were attacked by the Jewish state.

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