Israel and Britain have hailed the European Union for moving in the right direction after a new sanction on Iran was agreed.

The EU agreed on Monday morning to impose an oil embargo on Iran – one part of its wider challenge to Iran's nuclear programme.

Israel is far away from making a decision about military action against Iran, the country's defence minister has declared.

Ehud Barak, in an interview with Army Radio, refused to make forecasts about when a plan to tackle Iran's nuclear programme might emerge.

"We don't have a decision to go forward with these things," he said. "The whole thing is very far away."

Iran is planning to begin uranium enrichment soon at a new subterranean facility, bringing forward the moment when Israel and the United States will have to decide whether to launch a military strike.

Meanwhile, the clandestine campaign against the nuclear programme continues. This week another Iranian nuclear scientist was killed in Tehran.

Syria has claimed Israel represents a "grave and serious threat" at a meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

The accusation, about Israel's nuclear capabilities, was made by Syrian delegate Bassam al-Sabbagh.

But according to another delegate present, comments made by other Arab nations were less hostile towards Israel than on previous occasions.

Iran’s atomic energy envoy has claimed his country's findings made them an “Israeli assassination target.”

Earlier this week, Iran buried a senior commander and 17 others, killed after a huge explosion at one of Iran's most important military bases. Internet rumours blamed Mossad for explosion.

A report looking at Iran's nuclear plans is expected to reveal that the country has been receiving help from Russia, Pakistan and North Korea.

Distracted by the Arab Spring and the latest Palestinian theatrics, the West has paid little attention to Iran in recent months.

But revolutions or not, Iran's nuclear clock continues to tick and the hour of reckoning may now be near.

The Prime Minister has vowed that Britain will not allow Iran “to cast a nuclear shadow” over the Middle East.

David Cameron, addressing the Kuwaiti National Assembly on his first visit to the Middle East since the region erupted in popular protest, said it was “disappointing and gravely concerning” that Iran had not responded to “the hand of friendship”.

He said: “We will not stand by and allow Iran to cast a nuclear shadow over this region nor accept interference by Iran in the affairs of its neighbours.”

A leading figure in world Jewry has labelled the Egyptian opposition leader Mohammed ElBaradei “a stooge” of the Iranian regime.

Malcolm Honlein, the executive vice-president of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organisations, accused Mr ElBaradei of fronting for Iran and “distorting reports” during his 12 years as director of the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Israel’s Deputy Foreign Minister has warned that Iran must be stopped from becoming a nuclear power in order to “prevent another Hiroshima."

Danny Ayalon, who is on a four-day official visit to Japan, made the comments after visiting the memorial for victims of the 1945 Hiroshima bomb.

An estimated 140,000 people were killed by the Hiroshima bomb, the first time that an atomic weapon was used.

Mr Ayalon wrote on his Facebook page: “If we want to prevent another Hiroshima the international community needs immediately to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons.”

There was a farcical ending to Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's visit last week to Lebanon.

Hours before his departure on Thursday, he had one last meeting, at the Iranian embassy in Beirut. His local ally, Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, emerged from his hideout bringing him, as a tribute, a rifle supposedly taken from an Israeli soldier during the Second Lebanon War. But it was a sham. The rifle was an AK-47 Kalashnikov - not a weapon used by Israeli forces.

The much-heralded "switching on" of the Iranian nuclear reactor in Bushehr does not mean that an Israeli or American military attack is any nearer.

Despite some alarmist warnings, especially by former American ambassador the United Nations, John Bolton, this is not any sort of "point of no return". With close inspection by the IAEA and the Russian government, the light-water reactor won't give the Iranians the much-sought-after key to the nuclear power clubhouse.

Last week's feeding of fuel into Iran's Bushehr nuclear reactor came as a surprise. For years, Russia dragged its feet and found recurrent excuses to delay the completion of the Bushehr project. The ceremony marking the start of the reactor last Saturday indicates the last obstacle has now been removed.

Why Russia decided to proceed is open to debate - though one can surmise that Moscow wished to register its discontent with the autonomous sanctions that the US, Europe and other Western countries recently adopted against Iran's energy sector.

Nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu has been released from jail after serving a three month sentence.

The Israeli, 55, was first jailed in 1986 for disclosing confidential information about Israel’s nuclear operation to the British media.

He was released in 2004 but last year was arrested again for breaching the conditions of his parole. It was his second sentence for this.

Mr Vananu’s release had been conditional on him not travelling abroad, speaking to the media or having any contact with foreign nationals.

The author of a new book on the relationship between Israel and South Africa has accused Israeli President Shimon Peres of evading the question of whether he offered to sell nuclear weapons to the apartheid regime in the 1970s.

"If Peres denies he made such an offer, perhaps he would like to explain exactly what he did discuss at these meetings," said American academic Sasha Polakow-Suransky, author of The Unspoken Alliance: Israel's secret alliance with apartheid South Africa, published this week in the US.

The Israeli president has slammed The Guardian newspaper for its claim that Israel offered to sell South Africa nuclear weapons in the 1970s.

Shimon Peres said the allegations had no basis in reality and demanded a correction after the newspaper accused Israel of holding secret negotiations with South Africa's defence minister, PW Botha, in March 1975.

The newspaper said an American academic had uncovered secret documents showing that as Israel’s defence minister, Mr Peres had offered three sizes of warheads to the apartheid regime.

Israeli nuclear whistleblower Mordechai Vanunu is back in prison after violating parole conditions.

Mr Vanunu, 55, was jailed in 1986 for disclosing confidential information about Israel’s nuclear operation to the British media.

The former technician at the Negev Nuclear Research Centre served 18 years of his sentence and was released in 2004, on condition he did not travel abroad, speak to the media or have contact with foreign nationals.