JERUSALEM – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, standing next to the U.S. defense chief, said Wednesday without qualification that international economic sanctions have had no effect on Iran’s nuclear program and suggested Israeli patience was wearing thin, a statement that amounted to an indictment of President Barack Obama’s policy toward the Islamic republic.

Netanyahu dismissed U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta’s assurances that the United States shared its goal of a non-nuclear Iran, saying the central features of Washington’s strategy for stopping the Islamic republic’s nuclear ambitions – sanctions and diplomacy – were perilously close to failure.

Netanyahu did not explicitly threaten to attack Iran, but that was the unspoken implication of his assertion that all nonmilitary measures have proven ineffective in persuading Iran to change its course.