The memorandum of understanding between the United States and Iran has not been seen by Israel, a government official told NBC News.  Â
The official would not comment on whether or not Israeli diplomats had asked for a copy of the report which is set to be signed on Friday, or if they were denied it. Â
The Israeli government’s lack of participation in negotiations leading up to the treaty’s drafting has become a political scandal for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who faces career-defining elections before the end of October.
The stakes are huge for Netanyahu and the Israeli public: Israel went to war against Iran alongside the United States in late February, and its population endured weeks of Iranian counterattacks from ballistic missiles and drones.
In a speech on Monday night, Netanyahu defended the mission necessity, but acknowledged that he had not reviewed the draft agreement.
The draft has yet to be released publicly by any of the parties involved in negotiating it, but Bloomberg News published what it said was a copy of the draft on Wednesday.Â
That 14-point plan would see an end to the fighting, including in Lebanon where Israel has been battling the Iran-backed Hezbollah militant group since the start of the war, and open the Strait of Hormuz, Bloomberg reported. Â
But it leaves many of the most contentious issues, including the fate of Iran’s nuclear program, to a 60 day period of negotiations toward a “final agreement.â€
It’s unclear whether Israel will have any presence at those negotiations, which the Iranians said will begin in Geneva on the day the deal is signed. Israel isn’t mentioned in the draft MOU that Bloomberg published.
Though that draft declared an “end to the war on all fronts, including Lebanon,†it does not say that Israel would have to withdraw its forces from its northern neighbor.Â
Iranian officials had insisted that the MOU would require Israel to withdraw.
Though Israel’s northern border has been mostly quiet since Trump announced the deal on Sunday night, fighting between Israel and the Iran-backed militia group Hezbollah has continued in southern Lebanon.
