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US president Joe Biden and Israeli prime minister Yair Lapid will sign a joint declaration on Thursday committing the allies to work together to stop Iran developing a nuclear weapon. Biden arrived in Israel on Wednesday on his first trip to the Middle East as president and is meeting Lapid for talks on Thursday. “The joint declaration is a pledge and a commitment never to allow Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon and that we’re prepared to use all elements of our national power to ensure that outcome,” according to a senior US administration official. Though the allies are presenting a united front on Iran, it is not clear the two sides agree on the best way forward. Biden still wants a return to the deal Iran signed with western powers to address its nuclear programme and believes that diplomacy to restore the 2015 deal does not preclude pressuring Iran on other fronts. Iran’s elite Revolutionary Guards back proxy forces across the region. “It doesn’t have anything to do with whether or not the Quds force [an arm of the Guards] is going to stop or they’re going to continue to be engaged in activities. We can act against that and still have a deal where they curtail their nuclear programme,” Biden said in an interview with Israel’s Channel 12 that aired Wednesday evening. Israel, which has long opposed the deal, thinks it is time to move on from the accord, known as the JCPOA. It has stepped up a sabotage campaign against Iran’s nuclear activities and has welcomed US decisions to add new sanctions and keep the Revolutionary Guards on its list of foreign terror organisations. It has called on world powers to present a credible military threat to Iran to deter it from pursuing nuclear weapons further. “Time has run out on the JCPOA and it is crucial to exert pressure on Iran,” a senior Israeli official said. “Going back to the JCPOA is a short-term solution with very little benefits and a lot of drawbacks.” Biden told Israel’s Channel 12 that he would consider military action to stop Iran’s nuclear programme, “if it was a last resort”. Under former president Donald Trump, the US in 2018 pulled out of the nuclear deal — in which Iran had agreed to curbs on its nuclear programme in exchange for sanctions relief — and imposed hundreds of sanctions on the Islamic republic. Iran responded by aggressively ramping up its nuclear activity and is now enriching uranium at its highest-ever levels, close to weapons grade.