If Israel has to take action on its own, in order to stop Iran from developing the capability, the governor would respect that decision,” foreign policy adviser Dan Senor told reporters.

The comment made ahead of Romney’s planned meetings in Jerusalem with Israeli leaders seemed to differ with attempts by President Barack Obama to convince Israel to avoid any preemptive attack and let a regimen of international sanctions squeeze Iran’s economy until it agrees to nuclear concessions.

Netanyahu stressed that sanctions and international talks had failed to deter the Iranian regime: “We have to be honest and say that all the diplomacy and sanctions and diplomacy so far have not set back the Iranian program by one iota.”

Romney is on a seven-day overseas trip that started Friday in England, and arrived to Israel late on Sudnay. Israeli media sources reported that the visit aims at securing Jewish-American vote in the upcoming elections.

In excepts of a speech Romney was to deliver on Monday evening, the former Massachusetts governor planned to say that an aggressive approach to Tehran was needed to protect against a threat to the very existence of Israel, the closest US ally in the turbulent Middle East, according to Fox News. 

“When Iran’s leaders deny the Holocaust or speak of wiping this nation off the map, only the naive – or worse – will dismiss it as an excess of rhetoric,” he would say.

In addition to Netanyahu and other Israeli officials Romney will also sit down with Palestinian Prime Minister Salam Fayyad.

Iran’s controversial nuclear program has become the most pressing problem for the U.S. and Israel, even though Iran insists its nuclear program is for peaceful purposes.