WarSclerotic

Tehran: For restored Iranian aid, Hamas must go back to supporting Bashar Assad.

Hamas, Gaza Strip

The split in the Palestinian camp was more pronounced this week than ever. While a Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority team sat down with Israel in Washington for US-initiated peace talks after Israel agreed to release 104 jailed Palestinians, a secret Hamas delegation arrived in Tehran to patch up the Gaza rulers’ quarrel with Iran. debkafile reveals that the delegation, headed by Muhammad Nasr, included Hamas’ military wing commanders and some of the Palestinian prisoners freed to buy the release of the Israeli soldier Gilead Shalit.
Our Iranian sources reveal that Iranian officials made it clear that ties with Hamas would not be severed. But if the Palestinian group wanted the flow of money and weapons restored, it must revive its support for Syrian President Bashar Assad and undersign Hizballah’s military intervention in the Syrian conflict.
This was easier said than done. The Hamas delegation in Tehran was in no position for an authoritative reply, because it could only speak for one of the three sections of its bitterly divided movement, as listed  by debkafile sources:

1.  The Politburo chief Khaled Meshaal’s party claims since the overthrow of the Muslim Brotherhood’s president Mohamed Morsi in Cairo that Hamas must henceforth obey the Brotherhood’s “world leadership” and not the leaders under military siege in Cairo.

This is obviously an equivocation since the Egyptian Brotherhood constitutes the movement’s world leadership. Taking this line invites the Egyptian military to continue its crackdown on Hamas and the sealing off of the Gaza Strip by the destruction of the smuggling tunnels to Sinai which sustained it. This operation has deprived the Hamas regime of more than half of its regular revenue and is jeopardizing its grip on the territory.
2. The second party is led by the Hamas prime minister of Gaza Ismail Haniyeh. He has broken relations with Meshaal and no longer defers to his authority. Haniyeh argues that his movement should not worry about its low fortunes or the enmity of many parts of the Muslim world, including the new regime in Egypt, Iran, Damascus and HIzballah, because its focus should be on holding onto power in Gaza and enhancing its authority in the local population.
Like Meshaal, Haniyeh also begs the question. How can he explain this policy when he is too broke to pay the salaries of government officials and members of the military wing, the Izzedin al Qassam Brigades.

3. The third group is headed by pro-Iranian, pro-Hizballah Mahmoud a-Zahar, along with the military wing commanders Mohammed Deif and Marwan Issa and the Hamas representative in Turkey, Saleh al-Aruri, who is also in charge of Hamas operations on the West Bank.

This group maintains that Hamas lacks the strength and resources for standing up to Egypt and its Persian Gulf backers led by Saudi Arabia and must therefore run back fast to the radical Iran-Syria-Hizballah fold.

The fate and fortunes of Hamas bear strongly on the US-led Israeli-Palestinian negotiating track which was resumed in Washington his week after a three-year stalemate and is due to continue within two weeks.
Israel has twice switched its orientation with regard to the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip in the past nine months. In November 2012, Israel accepted the diplomacy of Muslim Brotherhood-ruled Egypt, Qatar and Turkey, for the ceasefire which ended its Pillar of Defense operation against Hamas missiles.
In July 2013, since the coup which overthrew the Muslim Brotherhood in Cairo, Israel is cooperating with the Egyptian military and its champion, Saudi Arabia.
This cooperation surfaced when Egyptian Apache gun ships appeared over Gaza skies following a secret Israeli deal with Cairo. What will happen when the Egyptian military goes forward with its plans for a major operation against Hamas – almost certainly in the teeth of opposition by the United States and Palestinian Authority with whom Israel launched peace talks this week?

7 reasons the Americans think this time will be different | The Times of Israel.

Undeterred by widespread Israeli and Palestinian skepticism, John Kerry is convinced he can broker a permanent accord. What does he know that we don’t?

President Barack Obama shakes hands with incoming Secretary of State John Kerry, Dec. 21, 2012, in Washington. (photo credit: AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

While the resumption of peace talks has been greeted with considerably more apathy, pessimism and outright hostility than optimism among Israelis and Palestinians, the American mediators are broadcasting an insistent confidence that things have changed and past failures might yet be overcome.

US Secretary of State John Kerry, the six-times-this-year visitor to the region to whom Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas ultimately could not say no, has been stressing that “this is a difficult process” and “many difficult choices lie ahead.” But, as Kerry said Tuesday at the media conference summing up the first two days of contacts, he is convinced that “we can get there.” Plainly, he wouldn’t have invested all that personal effort if he didn’t think there was a realistic prospect that the Israeli and Palestinian leaders would make the “reasonable compromises” he says are needed “on tough, complicated, emotional and symbolic issues.”

The next few months will determine if the skeptics — notably including veteran pundits who have seen so many such US-led peace bids crash and burn — have got it wrong this time, and the Kerry-led peace team has got it right. Here are 7 reasons the Americans, if not too many others, believe this time could be different.

1. President Barack Obama’s visit to the region is seen by the US peace team as the starting point of a potential sea change. Israelis were won over emotionally within minutes of Obama’s arrival at Ben Gurion Airport. He stressed the Jews’ attachment to this land, he took off his jacket, he went strolling around the airport in his shirtsleeves with “my friend Bibi,” and we were his. But the president is convinced that his trip had a substantive impact too, on Israelis, Palestinians and their leaders, impressing upon them the imperative to try to solve the conflict, and providing the assurance that his administration was committed to helping them do so.

2. Since then, Kerry has taken up the baton, and believes that he has built relationships of trust with Netanyahu and Abbas, convinced them of his investment in the peace effort, and gradually managed to create a more positive climate for progress. His efforts to minimize leaks have been a factor in the parties’ growing faith in him, the Americans believe. It’s an effort he’s intent on maintaining, so that private negotiations remain private — and trade-offs and compromises can be explored out of the media spotlight, without consequent public pressure — unless or until a deal is done. The appointment of Martin Indyk as the talks’ coordinator, they are confident, too, brings an experienced, trusted mediator into the mix. Indyk will be the hands-on player, possibly basing himself in the region as the talks move into higher gear. Kerry will be deeply involved, but has the rest of the world to worry about, and will not attend every session of negotiations.

3. Getting the sides to the table should have been relatively easy, and plainly wasn’t. Yet while critics highlight the fact that it took Kerry six trips to drag everybody off to Washington, the Americans prefer to highlight what they see as the tough decisions taken to get there. For Netanyahu, the wrenching agreement to the phased release of pre-Oslo prisoners; for Abbas, the climbdown on precondition demands for a settlement freeze and an Israeli acceptance of the pre-’67 lines as the basis for negotiating the borders of a Palestinian state. Maybe each leader only said yes to prevent the other from winning the blame game over a Kerry failure? Maybe, but that’s not the way the Americans see it.

Philip Gordon, National Security Council coordinator for the Middle East, arrives at the State Department in Washington, Monday, July 29, 2013. (photo credit: AP/Pablo Martinez Monsivais)

4. Unlike 2010, the last time the US managed to pull Israel and the Palestinians into the same room, there’s now a potentially lengthy period for the sides to negotiate. Three years ago, Abbas only came back to the table at the very end of Netanyahu’s 10-month settlement freeze, and the resumed talks were over almost as soon as they had begun. Now, they’ve committed to nine months of negotiation, and there’s more time if they need it, though Kerry believes nine months will be enough if there is a genuine readiness for viable compromise.

5. Both sides have committed to seriously discuss “all of the core issues,” as Kerry confirmed on Tuesday, and to do so early in the talks. Netanyahu may want Tzipi Livni to focus first on security; Abbas may want Saeb Erekat to initially concentrate on borders. But all issues are on the table from the get-go — including Jerusalem. The Americans know how wide the gaps are between the two sides. For instance, Netanyahu lectured Obama in the Oval Office, in public, two years ago about the impossibility of a return to the pre-1967 lines; but a return to those lines, with very minor adjustments, is precisely what Abbas is insisting upon. And yet, the Americans are convinced that, with growing trust, the necessary trade-offs can be made. Kerry did not engage in substantive back-and-forth negotiations on core issues during his half-a-dozen recent visits here. His focus was the back-and-forth on getting the sides to the table. But he knows the Israeli and Palestinian positions on the core issues, and believes both that reasonable compromises exist, and that the respective leaderships are capable of reaching them.

6. The Americans do not regard Abbas’s failure to seize Ehud Olmert’s 2008 offer to Abbas — which included a full withdrawal from the West Bank with one-for-one land swaps to encompass major settlement blocs, the division of Jerusalem into sovereign Israeli and Palestinian areas, and the relinquishing of Israeli sovereignty in favor of a non-sovereign trusteeship in the Holy Basin — as proof of Abbas’s ultimate intransigence. They believe both Abbas and Netanyahu have been impacted by the passage of time, by the new regional environment, by a shared concern at the conflict moving into a zone in which it becomes unresolvable. It’s not entirely clear why or how they believe these factors might soften the sides’ positions and lead them to take decisions they would not previously have taken. Regional instability is unlikely to push Netanyahu toward a greater readiness for territorial compromise, for instance, though the desire for greater concerted pressure on Iran might. But believe they do. Unlike the Olmert offer, sprung on Abbas on a “take it or leave it” basis by a prime minister soon to leave office, any deal this time would be arrived at gradually, through mutual trade-off and compromise.

7. The goal is emphatically to reach a final status, end-of-conflict accord. But the Americans are adamant that they do have fall-back positions. As underlined by the eruption of the Second Intifada in late 2000 — the Arafat-inspired strategic onslaught of suicide bombings — following the failure of the Camp David peace effort hosted by president Clinton, the Kerry team knows it would be irresponsible to shoot for the moon without a Plan B alternative landing place in the stars. Some kind of interim accord? Well, possibly. But to discuss it in any detail would be to undermine that effort at the real deal — an effort they are cautiously optimistic, this time, will pay off.

Ashton: Revived talks opens new doors for EU contribution to peace, security | JPost | Israel News.

Iran may also be enriching uranium using lasers, U.S. think tank says – Diplomacy & Defense – Israel News | Haaretz.

Institute for Science and International Security recommends further sanctions if Tehran does not give answers to the IAEA.

By Haaretz | Jul. 30, 2013 | 6:08 PM | 5

Former Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Photo by AP

Iran is suspected of secretly enriching uranium with the help of lasers, a program it says it ceased in 2003, according to a report by the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security. Iran only admits to enriching uranium via centrifuges.

The institute says Iran is still developing laser technology for enriching uranium. It notes accelerated construction at a site where this type of enrichment was once performed, and mentions then-President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s 2010 statement that Iran had the ability to enrich uranium via laser isotope separation.

Based in part on images from commercial satellites, the institute notes the expansion of the Lashkar Ab’ad facility, where laser-assisted enrichment experiments have been done in the past. The facility was exposed in 2003 and later investigated by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Iran later announced that it had no intention of enriching uranium using laser technology, and IAEA agents who visited the facility said laser technology there was for civilian purposes. In February 2010, Ahmadinejad said Iran would for the time being enrich uranium using centrifuges rather than lasers, but the institute says the issue must be investigated considering Iran’s record of false statements.

The institute says Iran is taking steps to conceal the connection between the Lashkar Ab’ad facility and other organizations involved in laser technology, one of which has been subject to sanctions by the United States and the European Union.

The institute recommends that as long as Iran does not provide answers to the IAEA, it should be prevented from enriching uranium using lasers; one means would be additional sanctions on organizations and individuals involved in the field. The institute calls on governments to act immediately to prevent the transfer of laser technology and equipment to Iran.

The method of enriching uranium by exposing its vapors to laser beams was developed in Israel in 1969 by two young scientists: Prof. Menahem Levin of Tel Aviv University and Prof. Yeshayahu Nebenzahl. The two sought to patent the invention, but the state forbade them.

A few years later they discovered that the secret had leaked to the United States and that an Exxon subsidiary had built a facility using this method. The two professors later received monetary compensation after suing the state for not letting them take out a patent.

In any case, the method is expensive, requiring hundreds of tons of uranium. Iran began trying to enrich uranium using lasers under the Shah, when American companies were eager to sell Tehran nuclear technology of all types, including reactors, enriched uranium and laser laboratories.

The experiments went on secretly during the presidency of Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, who revived Iran’s nuclear program in the 1990s. These experiments were exposed only in 2003 following visits by IAEA agents.

In 2007 Yossi Melman, writing for Haaretz, assessed that Iran had not achieved a breakthrough on the laser method. He said it was hard to believe that after the United States, Britain, France, the Soviet Union, China, Australia, and, according to foreign sources, Israel had failed to make significant progress, Iran would.

Levin himself has said that uranium enrichment via gas centrifuges is cheaper and better. Breakthroughs in recent years in the United States have made this method more efficient, but it is unclear whether Iran is capable of such technology.

In any case, Israeli officials have said in recent weeks that the pace of enrichment in the centrifuges that Iran is now building will let it skip from 3.5-percent enrichment to above the 90 percent needed for a nuclear bomb. The fear is that within weeks Iran will overcome the last obstacle to building a bomb without Western intelligence knowing ahead of time.

Ex-Mossad Head: Peace Talks were Bungled – Middle East – News – Israel National News.

Meir Dagan

Flash 90

Meir Dagan, the former head of the Mossad intelligence agency, said in an interview published Tuesday that the negotiations vis-a-vis the Palestinian Authority (PA) were poorly handled and therefore do not have much chance of succeeding.

“This should have been handled differently,” he explained. “We should have conducted secret negotiations with the Arab League, and only then begun open negotiations with the PA. The problem of Jerusalem, for instance, is not a PA problem but a problem of the entire Arab world. At least two states, like Jordan and Saudi Arabia, need to be brought on board, in order to give backing to any move.”

The PA and Israel have common reasons to want to advance the talks, Dagan opined. These include “the strengthening of Islam, the Iranian problem and the weakening of the PA. All these can give a boost, but I do not have much hope for the negotiations that began tonight.”

Regarding Syria, Dagan said that Israel need not fear “a few dozen Al Qaeda terrorists along the fence.” It is the Syrian army that gives Israel a reason to worry, he said, “and as far as Israel is concerned, Assad needs to go home as soon as possible.”

Dagan said that the military regime in Egypt is a good thing for Israel, and that Jordan is also in a good situation. “The regime is stable and strong, and the Hashemite monarchy is in full control of the kingdom.”

“At this time,” Dagan added, “Israel has no need to attack in Iran. We have not yet reached that situation. When the reality changes, western intelligence will know everything. Today, an attack means uniting the Iranian nation, which is currently disunited, against Israel – and this includes a war. At this time, it will give us nothing.”

Iran May Achieve Nuclear Breakout Capability in Mid-2014 – Bloomberg.

Iran may achieve the “critical capability” to process low-enriched uranium into fuel for a nuclear weapon without detection by international inspectors by mid-2014, according to a report by a research group.

Iran would reach this capability by acting on plans to install thousands of additional enrichment centrifuges at its Natanz and Fordow sites, according to David Albright, a former nuclear inspector, and Christina Walrond of the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security.

 

An Iranian worker puts on the final touches to a mural of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei at Enghelab square in Tehran. Photographer: Majid Saeedi/Getty Images

Preventing Iran from achieving the capability to break out from nuclear safeguards will require international efforts to limit the number and type of centrifuges built by the nation, according to the report issued yesterday.

“Although increasing the frequency and type of inspections at the enrichment plants is important, it is by no means sufficient to prevent Iran from achieving critical capability,” according to the analysts.

President Barack Obama has said the U.S. will prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. America and other world powers are seeking an initial agreement halting Iran’s production of 20 percent enriched uranium — one processing step short of weapons-grade — and removing the stockpile of such medium-enriched uranium so that it can’t be diverted for weapons.

Enrichment Focus

The institute’s report focuses instead on Iran’s production of low-enriched uranium, usable as reactor fuel for power generators, which may be further enriched to bomb grade given time and sufficient centrifuges. Albright and Walrond cited scenarios in which current safeguard measures would be insufficient to detect quickly an Iranian decision to divert enough low-enriched uranium to make weapons-grade material for one or more nuclear weapons.

“Breakout times at critical capability would be so short that there simply would not be enough time to organize an international diplomatic or military response,” the analysts said.

Iran’s leaders have said its nuclear program is for civilian purposes. U.S. intelligence agencies have assessed that Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei hasn’t made a decision to produce a bomb, though the nation is developing its capability to do so.

Enrichment facilities in Fordow, near the holy city of Qom, and Natanz, 130 miles southeast of Tehran, are run by Iran and monitored by the International Atomic Energy Agency. Iran says the 20 percent enriched uranium, which has been of the most immediate global concern, is being processed to provide fuel for a research reactor used to produce medical isotopes.

The institute’s report says monitoring alone isn’t enough and that international negotiations should press for a halt to installation of additional centrifuges and set a cap on the total number and capabilities of those production devices.

The report also raises the possibility that Iran may be building another enrichment facility that it hasn’t declared to international monitors and that would provide an alternative route to a breakout nuclear-weapons capability.

To contact the reporter on this story: Terry Atlas in Washington at tatlas@bloomberg.net