Markets Anxious Before Netanyahu's 1pm Iran Announcement: Chart

(Bloomberg) -- Israel’s Tel Aviv 35 index dropped and oil prices rose on news that Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu will make a statement at the Defense Ministry in Tel Aviv at 8pm local time (1pm ET) which his media adviser says will contain a “significant development” regarding the Iranian nuclear pact.

“In recent days, it seems increasingly clear that Israel is willing to confront Iran more openly, and probably more aggressively, than in the past,” Eran Peleg, Clarity Capital KCPS Ltd.’s chief investment officer, said in an email to Bloomberg.

"For now, the battlefield is Syria and the diplomatic sphere," with tonight’s emphasis likely on diplomacy, Peleg said. Though in Israel the public “is starting to feel the increasing tension.”

To contact the reporters on this story: Morwenna Coniam in New York at mconiam@bloomberg.net, Felice Maranz in New York at fmaranz@bloomberg.net.

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Catherine Larkin at clarkin4@bloomberg.net, Morwenna Coniam, Brad Olesen

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