However, there was no official response from Tehran to a far blunter message from Shimon Peres, the president of Israel, who called on Iran to "return to the enlightened world" and halt the uranium enrichment that could allow it manufacture nuclear weapons.
Even as he was addressing Congress yesterday, US officials were in talks with Iran over proposals that could allow Tehran to keep 6,000 enrichment centrifuges and send stockpiles of partially enriched uranium to a third country (probably Russia) for safekeeping, in return for rigorous inspection of its nuclear facilities.
After months of impasse on that question, the two sides are considering a proposal that could allow Iran to keep around 6,500 centrifuges -- far more than earlier proposals -- if it accepts other provisions aimed at reducing its production and stockpile of uranium.
That could allow Iran to start negotiations about the future of its nuclear program while continuing to enrich uranium at current levels.
That could allow the vehicle to roll.
Iran's enrichment of uranium is at the center of those discussions, with Western countries suspecting the country of stockpiling enriched uranium that could be rapidly converted into weapons-grade material.
If Trump acts against the deal (or even if he just sits back and allows Republican hawks to enact new sanctions legislation) it is to be expected that the Iranians will walk away from it and revert to their previous policy: enriching uranium that could someday be used to create a nuclear weapon.
With the amount of highly enriched uranium that could fit into six milk cartons, a terrorist could improvise a nuclear device to level a medium-sized city.
It has shown interest in working with Urenco in the past and already uses a plant in Preston, England, that turns refined uranium ore into the uranium hexafluoride that could serve as feedstock for Urenco's nearby Capenhurst complex.
In the 1950s and 1960s, this area was the center of the uranium mining rush, as the United States government offered a premium for any ore discoveries that might lead to a uranium deposit that could be mined.
