WASHINGTON (JTA) – Candidates in a Republican presidential debate were divided over whether to honor the Iran nuclear deal. The question of whether or not to abandon the deal drew unusually sharp divisions in the CNN debate on Wednesday evening. Front-runner Donald Trump called the Iran deal “one of the worst contracts of any kind I’ve ever seen,” but did not say whether he would kill it.

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said, “This deal abandons four American hostages in Iran, and this deal will only accelerate Iran’s acquiring nuclear weapons. … If I am elected president, on the very first day in office, I will rip to shreds this catastrophic Iranian nuclear deal.”

Ohio Governor John Kasich agreed the deal was a “bad” one, but said it was better to work with the allies who helped negotiate it. “If we find out that they may be developing a nuclear weapon, then the military option is on the table,” he said. “We are stronger when we work with the Western civilization, our friends in Europe, and just doing it on our own I don’t think is the right policy.”

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., agreed with Kasich, calling Cruz’s proposal “absurd.”

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker added, “I was one of the first ones to call for terminating the bad deal with Iran on day one.”

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush disagreed with Walker, saying, “it’s not a strategy to tear up an agreement.” Instead, Bush said, “The first thing that we need to do is to establish our commitment to Israel which has been altered by this administration. And, make sure that they have the most sophisticated weapons to send a signal to Iran that we have Israel’s back.”

Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee said, “we must, simply, make it very clear that the next president, one of us on this stage, will absolutely not honor that agreement, and will destroy it and will be tough with Iran, because otherwise we put every person in this world in a very dangerous place.”

Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., derided those “who said we should trust this Iranian deal, see if the Iranians will comply.” Referring to the Iranian supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Rubio said, “Anyone who is paying attention to what Khamenei says knows that they will not comply.”

Former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina said that on her first day in office, she would first call Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to assure him “we will stand with the state of Israel” and then Khamenei “to tell him that unless and until he opens every military and every nuclear facility to real anytime, anywhere inspections by our people, not his, we, the United States of America, will make it as difficult as possible [to] move money around the global financial system.” Fiorina did not directly say she would abrogate the agreement, but threatened sanctions unless Khamenei allows in American inspectors with unfettered access – which would effectively quash the deal.

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said, “I will not agree to anything with a country that says death to us and death to Israel and holds our hostages while we sign agreements with them.”

Only Ben Carson did not say how he would approach the deal.

Christie was among four candidates who included a reference to Israel in his closing remarks; the others were Cruz, Rubio and Huckabee. Cruz said one of his first acts would be to move the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv to Jerusalem.

Kasich quoted in his closing remarks from a Holocaust memorial on the statehouse grounds: “If you’ve saved one life, you’ve changed the world.”