WASHINGTON: The Obama administration may be about to rewrite a decades-old bipartisan American policy on Israel’s nuclear arsenal.

Democratic and Republican presidents previously have refused to pressure Israel to sign the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, but President Barack Obama is shaking things up.

The first hint of this change came in Prague on April 5, when Obama outlined his vision for addressing the threat presented by the proliferation of nuclear arms and how the United States could contribute to the ultimate goal of reducing the number of these weapons to zero. Then this week, Assistant US Secretary Rose Gottemoeller, the top US negotiator and head of the US delegation at the UN meeting on the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), on Tuesday called for those who have refused to join the NPT to sign the nuclear pact.

“Universal adherence to the NPT itself, including by India, Israel, Pakistan and North Korea, ...remains a fundamental objective of the United States,” Gottemoeller said at the meeting.

As the sole possessor of nukes in Middle East – Israel, joining the treaty would require Israel to declare and relinquish its nuclear arsenal. Gottemoeller declined to specify to reporters whether the Obama administration would press Israel to join the treaty.

Under its policy of ‘strategic ambiguity,’ Israel has neither admitted nor denied possessing nuclear weapons. The US has previously shielded Israel — which has an estimated 80 to 200 nuclear warheads — from condemnation during the past 40 years. US support for Israel is in line with an accord inked in Sept. 1969 between former Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir and former President Richard Nixon, according to recently released documents.

The so-called “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” deal commits both the US and Israel never to acknowledge information pertinent to Israeli nukes in public.

“This treaty has proven its ineffectiveness, it did not prevent countries like India, Pakistan and North Korea from acquiring nuclear arms,” AFP cited a senior Israeli Foreign Ministry official as saying yesterday. Tel Aviv dismissed the call, saying Gottemoeller’s comments were viewed as “no change in Washington policy” for the moment.

“It is inconceivable that in these conditions one can consider this treaty as something that can change anything in the international nuclear domain,” the source added.

In 1986, Israeli nuclear scientist Mordecai Vanunu disclosed in the Sunday Times of London photos and the first insider account of Israel’s primary nuclear facility in Dimona.

The revelation cost Vanunu 18 years in jail over treason charges and a travel ban that bars him from leaving Israel.

Obama’s efforts for universal adherence to the NPT, including Israel, will certainly be on the agenda when Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu meets with Obama on May 18 in Washington, when Netanyahu is expected to seek assurances from Obama that he will uphold the US commitment and will not trade Israeli nuclear concessions for Iranian ones.

Meanwhile, Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Mohammad Ali Hosseini jumped into the fray yesterday by saying that the halt of US cooperation with “Zionists” (Israel) is a step toward nuclear disarmament worldwide, the official IRNA news agency reported.

“Any measure taken by the US regarding nuclear disarmament should be verifiable, transparent and irreversible,” Hosseini said, adding that US officials should take more practical steps if they were honest about helping nuclear disarmament worldwide.

India is another hot topic at the current meetings on the NPT taking place at UN headquarters this week, because India also enjoys a special nuclear agreement with the United States without being at the same time a signatory to the NPT. Despite India’s reluctance to join the NPT, Gottemoeller said Delhi has indicated a willingness to cooperate, including on the Fissile Materials Cutoff Treaty, the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, and on improving controls on its nuclear-materials exports.

In a joint declaration on April 1, Obama and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev ordered negotiators to start work on a new treaty to reduce their nuclear stockpiles as a first step toward “a nuclear weapon-free world.”