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Republican candidate John Kasich has condemned the Obama administration’s Iran nuclear deal and pledged: “In a Kasich administration, there will be no more delusional agreements with self-declared enemies.”

John Kasich addresses the annual policy conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (Aipac) in Washington, DC. Photograph: Alex Wong/Getty Images

The former Ohio governor told the American Israel Public Affairs Committee policy conference how he had flown to the House of Representatives for the first timein 15 yearsto listen to the Israeli prime minister raise concerns about the Iran nuclear accord “to show my respect, personal respect to the people of Israel.

“And I want you all to know that I have called for the suspension of the US’s participation in the Iran nuclear deal in reaction to Iran’s recent ballistic missile tests,” Kasich said.

That remark produced rapturous applause at the conference in Washington, where earlier Democrat Hillary Clinton had reaffirmed her support for the deal. The Republican continued: “These tests were both a violation of the spirit of the nuclear deal and provocations that can no longer be ignored.

“One of the missiles had printed on it in Hebrew – can you believe this? – ‘Israel must be exterminated’. And I will instantly gather the world and lead us to reapply sanctions if Iran violated one crossed t or one dot of that nuclear deal. We must put sanctions back on them as the world community, together.”

Kasich said Israel, which he first visited in 1983, is in one of the world’s “roughest neighbourhoods”. He accused Palestinians of promoting a “culture of hatred and death” that included anti-semitic textbooks at schools and the naming of streets and football tournaments named after terrorists.

As president he could lead a coalition to defeat Isis in the air and on the ground, he added. “We’re all in this together.”

A distant third behind Donald Trump and Ted Cruz in the Republican race, Kasich called for politicians to rededicate themselves to a bipartisan national security policy that Ronald Reagan and Democrats once achieved. “I will not take the low road to the highest office in the land,” he said.

He also told the gathering that he had supported the building of a Holocaust memorial designed by architect Daniel Libeskind in Ohio. “My support and friendship for our strategic partner Israel has been firm and unwavering for more than 35 years of my professional life.”

Describing Israel as a “bedrock partner” in regional security, he added: “Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East. America’s and Israel’s interests are tightly intertwined, despite our inevitable disagreements from time to time.”

