A top Iranian military commander said on Wednesday that the country has missiles that can reach the nuclear sites of its arch-foe Israel.

"Today the Islamic republic has missiles with a range of more than 2,000 kilometres (1,250 miles) and... all the land of the Zionist regime, including its nuclear installations, is within our range," Mohammad Ali Jafari, the head of Iran's Revolutionary Guards Corps, told the ISNA news agency.

Jafari's comment came amid sustained speculation that Israel has the ability to target Iranian nuclear plants.

Jafari said Iran can "firmly retaliate" if attacked.

"The doctrine of our system is defensive but, if any action is taken by the enemy, including the Zionist regime, we can firmly retaliate," he said.

However defence analysts question the accuracy of Iran's longer-range missiles, particularly the Shahab-3.

Israel has a major nuclear facility at Dimona in the Negev desert, at which it is widely believed to have developed a nuclear arsenal.

Israel maintains a policy of neither confirming nor denying a nuclear capability but it is widely suspected to have more than 200 warheads.

Iran does not recognise its archfoe Israel and has repeatedly predicted its demise.

Nuclear breakthrough possible if US changes attitude: Iran
A breakthrough is possible in the nuclear standoff between Iran and the West, if the United States changes its attitude towards Tehran, the Iranian envoy to the UN atomic watchdog said Wednesday.

If Washington changed its "mentality ... and they understand that we're on an equal footing, and they come in a civilised manner to the negotiating table, then there will be a breakthrough," Iranian ambassador Ali Asghar Soltanieh told reporters on the sidelines of a meeting of the International Atomic Energy Agency's 35-member board here.

"But they not only have to recognise our inalienable right (to nuclear technology) for peaceful uses, but they should remove any obstacles for the implementation of these rights, including the fuel cycle and enrichment," Soltanieh said.

The West accuses Iran of seeking to develop the atomic bomb under guise of a nuclear energy programme, a charge Tehran vehemently denies.

For the West, the main sticking point is Iran's refusal to suspend uranium enrichment, a process that can be used not only to make nuclear fuel, but also the fissile material for a bomb, despite three rounds of UN sanctions.

Tehran insists that, as a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), it has a right to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes.

Despite a six-year investigation, the IAEA is still not in a position to definitively say that Iran's nuclear activities are entirely peaceful.

Earlier this week, IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei complained of a deadlock, with Iran stonewalling key questions on the possible military dimension of past nuclear work and defying UN orders to stop enrichment.

But Soltanieh said the deadlock was of the West's making, not Tehran's.

If the situation really is "stalemated", "it is not a technical but a political stalemate," he said.

"It's not a technical stalemate because the agency is continuously implementing safeguards in Iran without any impediments. If the DG (director general) is right, it is a political stalemate, which has been created by a few Western countries."

On Monday, ElBaradei expressed hope that a possible shift in policy in Washington could help break the deadlock.

And on Tuesday, the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany had said in a rare joint statement that they were committed to direct diplomacy with Iran.

Responding to that statement on Wednesday, Soltanieh said that could be "an indication they've come to the conclusion that they have to correct the mistake of sending the issue to (UN Security Council) in New York."

Tehran has long argued that the Iranian nuclear dossier is a matter solely for the IAEA, not the UN Security Council.

Not wanting to be too optimistic, "this may might be a way to correct their mistake and stop the engagement of the UN Security Council," he said.