TEHRAN (AFP) -- Iran's armed forces on Saturday vowed to hit back against any military strike after a top Israeli official refused to rule out attacking the Islamic republic over its nuclear program.

"The armed forces of the Islamic Republic of Iran will firmly respond to any military and threatening move," Brigader General Ali Fazli, spokesman for Iran's latest round of 10-day war games, told state television.

"The Iranian armed forces, which realize the different threats, have the capacity and capability to confront them," he added. Israeli Deputy Defense Minister Ephraim Sneh had told the Jerusalem Post on Friday he considered military action against Iran as a "last resort. But even the last resort is sometimes the only resort."

"The enemies of the Islamic republic are too weak and too abject to be a threat for a powerful Iran," added Fazli, who did not specify what the nature of Iran's response would be.

Meanwhile, Mohammad Javad Zarif, Iran's ambassador to the United Nations, complained to Secretary General Kofi Annan and the Security Council over Israel's "threats" on Friday following the comments by Sneh.

"The letter, underlining threats from Sneh and other Israeli officials, regards these statements as illegal, ridiculous and a sign of the Zionist regime's criminal policies and terrorist intentions," the IRNA state agency said.

"Unfortunately the Security Council's inaction over the Israeli regime's terrorist acts have emboldened this regime to continue its crimes and not heed the most obvious international principles and the UN convention," it quoted the letter as saying.

"The Security Council should act in the face of such statements and the Israeli regime's terrorist acts. As a first step it should at least promptly condemn the Israeli regime's threats against Tehran," it said.

Israel is the only country in the Middle East to have a nuclear arsenal, estimated at 200 warheads.