The Financial Times focuses on the summit of the Non-Aligned Movement in Tehran being used by Iran as a platform to attack Israeli and US policy on its nuclear programme. The Daily Telegraph reports that Ban Ki-moon, the UN Secretary-General, used the international summit in Tehran to criticise Iran’s leaders for their nuclear activities and attitudes towards Israel. The paper also notes that according to a new UN report, Iran has more than doubled its capacity to refine uranium at an underground bunker, accusing Tehran of re-activating a shadowy scientist at the heart of its alleged nuclear weapons programme. The Guardian and the Independent report that General Martin Dempsey, the most senior US military officer, claimed yesterday that an Israeli attack on Iran would delay but would not stop its nuclear programme. The Guardian and the Times report that Egypt’s president Mohammed Mursi said yesterday that the “oppressive” Syrian regime had lost all legitimacy, in a blistering speech in Tehran that provoked the Syrian delegation to storm out and amounted to a stunning rebuke to his Iranian hosts.

In the Israeli press, all news websites note the criticism made by US Republican Presidential nominee Mitt Romney against the current administration’s policy toward Israel. All papers also report that a Qassam rocket directly hit a house in the southern Israeli town of Sderot. One woman was treated for shock. The papers also cover the UN report on Iran’s nuclear activity, which signalled a significant expansion of underground nuclear activity. Haaretz reports that during a phone call with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, German Chancellor Angela Merkel asked that Israel avoid an attack on Iran to allow more time for international sanctions and diplomacy. The Times of Israel reports that United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon delivered a sharp rebuttal to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Thursday, after Khamenei delivered a speech denouncing Israel, the UN and the US at the Non-Aligned Movement summit in Tehran. Several papers note that the US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staffs General Martin Dempsey warned that, while it may delay the Iranian nuclear programme, an Israeli military campaign could also unravel international sanctions on the Tehran regime. A Palestinian Authority official, quoted in the Jerusalem Post, saying that PA President Mahmoud Abbas will not ask the UN General Assembly to recognise a Palestinian state next month because of US “threats and extortion.” The paper also notes that according to sources close to Netanyahu, the PM will do everything possible to pass the 2013 state budget and avoid initiating an early election that he believes would be bad for Israel and for the Likud.