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Exclusive: Cornered but unbound by nuclear pact, Israel reconsiders military action against Iran

November 22, 2014

Exclusive: Cornered but unbound by nuclear pact, Israel reconsiders military action against Iran, Jerusalem Post, Michael Wilner, November 22, 2014

( “By framing the deal as fundamentally flawed, regardless of its enforcement, Israel is telling the world that it will not wait to see whether inspectors do their jobs as ordered.” )

Israeli official cites “sunset clause” in proposed comprehensive deal, which guarantees Iran a path into the nuclear club and may corner Israel into war.

IAF pix

Israel Air Force planes fly over Tel Aviv. . (photo credit:IDF SPOKESPERSON’S UNIT)

[M]ore than any single enforcement standard or cap included in the deal, Israel believes the Achilles’ heel of the proposed agreement is its definitive end date – the sunset clause.

“You’ve not dismantled the infrastructure, you’ve basically tried to put limits that you think are going to be monitored by inspectors and intelligence,” said the official, “and then after this period of time, Iran is basically free to do whatever it wants.”

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WASHINGTON — Historic negotiations with Iran will reach an inflection point on Monday, as world powers seek to clinch a comprehensive deal that will, to their satisfaction, end concerns over the nature of its vast, decade-old nuclear program.

But sharing details of the deal under discussion with The Jerusalem Post on the eve of the deadline, Israel has issued a stark, public warning to its allies with a clear argument: Current proposals guarantee the perpetuation of a crisis, backing Israel into a corner from which military force against Iran provides the only logical exit.

The deal on the table

World powers have presented Iran with an accord that would restrict its nuclear program for ten years and cap its ability to produce fissile material for a weapon during that time to a minimum nine-month period.

Should Tehran agree, the deal may rely on Russia to convert Iran’s current uranium stockpile into fuel rods for peaceful use. The proposal would also include an inspection regime that would attempt to follow the program’s entire supply chain, from the mining of raw material to the syphoning of that material to various nuclear facilities across Iran.

Israel’s leaders believe the best of a worst-case scenario, should that deal be reached, is for inspections to go perfectly and for Iran to choose to abide by the deal for the entire decade-long period.

But “our intelligence agencies are not perfect,” an Israeli official said. “We did not know for years about Natanz and Qom. And inspection regimes are certainly not perfect. They weren’t in the case in North Korea, and it isn’t the case now – Iran’s been giving the IAEA the run around for years about its past activities.”

“What’s going to happen with that?” the official continued. “Are they going to sweep that under the rug if there’s a deal?”

On Saturday afternoon, reports from Vienna suggested the P5+1 – the US, United Kingdom, France, Russia, China and Germany – are willing to stop short of demanding full disclosure of any secret weapon work by Tehran.

Speaking to the Post, a senior US official rejected concern over limited surveillance capabilities, during or after a deal.

“If we can conclude a comprehensive agreement, we will have significantly more ability to detect covert facilities – even after its duration is over – than we do today,” the senior US official said. “After the duration of the agreement, the most intrusive inspections will continue: the Additional Protocol – which encompasses very intrusive transparency, and which Iran has already said it will implement – will continue.”

But compounding Israel’s fears, the proposal Jerusalem has seen shows that mass dismantlement of Iran’s nuclear infrastructure – including the destruction, and not the mere warehousing, of its parts – is no longer on the table in Vienna.

“Iran’s not being asked to dismantle the nuclear infrastructure,” the Israeli official said, having seen the proposal before the weekend. “Right now what they’re talking about is something very different. They’re talking about Ayatollah Khamenei allowing the P5+1 to save face.”

Officials in the Netanyahu government are satisfied that their ideas and concerns have been given a fair hearing by their American counterparts. They praise the US for granting Israel unprecedented visibility into the process.

But while those discussions may have affected the talks at the margins, large gaps – on whether to grant Iran the right to enrich uranium, or allow it to keep much of its infrastructure – have remained largely unaddressed.

“It’s like the chemical weapons deal in Syria,” the official said. “They didn’t just say: Here, let’s get rid of the stockpile and the weapons, but we will leave all the plants and assembly lines.”

‘Sunset clause’

Yet, more than any single enforcement standard or cap included in the deal, Israel believes the Achilles’ heel of the proposed agreement is its definitive end date – the sunset clause.

“You’ve not dismantled the infrastructure, you’ve basically tried to put limits that you think are going to be monitored by inspectors and intelligence,” said the official, “and then after this period of time, Iran is basically free to do whatever it wants.”

The Obama administration also rejects this claim. By e-mail, the senior US administration official said that, “‘following successful implementation of the final step of the comprehensive solution for its duration, the Iranian nuclear program will be treated in the same manner as that of any non-nuclear weapon state party to the NPT – with an emphasis on non-nuclear weapon.”

“That has in no way changed,” the American official continued, quoting the interim Joint Plan of Action reached last year.

But the treatment of Iran as any other signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty –189 countries are members, including Iran – would allow Tehran to ultimately acquire “an industrial-sized capability,” the Israelis say. “The breakout times [to a nuclear weapon] will be effectively zero.”

Israel and world powers seek to maximize the amount of time they would have to identify non-compliance from a nuclear deal, should Iran choose to defy its tenets and build a bomb.

But in the deal under discussion in Vienna, Iran would be able to comply with international standards for a decade and, from Israel’s perspective, then walk, not sneak, into the nuclear club.

“You’ve not only created a deal that leaves Iran as a threshold nuclear power today, because they have the capability to break out quickly if they wanted to,” the Israeli official contended. “But you’ve also legitimized Iran as a military nuclear power in the future.”

From the moment this deal is clinched, Israel fears it will guarantee Iran as a military nuclear power. There will be no off ramp, because Iran’s reentry into the international community will be fixed, a fait accompli, by the very powers trying to contain it.

“The statement that says we’ve prevented them from having a nuclear weapon is not a true statement,” the Israeli official continued. “What you’ve said is, you’re going to put restrictions on Iran for a given number of years, after which there will be no restrictions and no sanctions. That’s the deal that’s on the table.”

Revisiting the use of force

Without an exit ramp, Israel insists its hands will not be tied by an agreement reached this week, this month or next, should it contain a clause that ultimately normalizes Iran’s home-grown enrichment program.

On the surface, its leadership dismisses fears that Israel will be punished or delegitimized if it disrupts an historic, international deal on the nuclear program with unilateral military action against its infrastructure.

By framing the deal as fundamentally flawed, regardless of its enforcement, Israel is telling the world that it will not wait to see whether inspectors do their jobs as ordered.

“Ten, fifteen years in the life of a politician is a long time,” the Israeli said, in a vague swipe against the political directors now scrambling in Vienna. “In the life of a nation, it’s nothing.”

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has threatened the use of force against Iran several times since 2009, even seeking authorization from his cabinet in 2011. Iran’s program has since grown in size and scope.

According to his aides, the prime minister’s preference is not war, but the continuation of a tight sanctions regime on Iran’s economy coupled with a credible threat of military force. Netanyahu believes more time under duress would have led to an acceptable deal. But that opportunity, in his mind, may now be lost.

Whether Israel still has the ability to strike Iran, without American assistance, is an open question. Quoted last month in the Atlanticmagazine, US officials suggested that window for Netanyahu closed over two years ago.

But responding to claims by that same official, quoted by Jeffrey Goldberg, over Netanyahu’s courage and will, the Israeli official responded sternly: “The prime minister is a very serious man who knows the serious responsibility that rests on his shoulders. He wouldn’t say the statements that he made if he didn’t mean them.”

“People have underestimated Israel many, many times in the past,” he continued, “and they underestimate it now.”

Categories: Iran, Iran scam, Iranian nukes, Israel, Kerry, P5+1
Tags: Iran, Iran Scam, Israel, Israel Air Force, Nukes

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As Iran Deadline Approaches, European Leaders More Skeptical Than American Counterparts Over Prospects for Final Nuclear Deal

November 21, 2014

As Iran Deadline Approaches, European Leaders More Skeptical Than American Counterparts Over Prospects for Final Nuclear Deal, Algemeiner, Ben Cohen, November 21, 2014

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Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif in Vienna with EU negotiator Catherine Ashton and US Secretary of State John Kerry. Photo: Twitter

With four days to go before the international deadline for an agreement over Iran’s nuclear program expires, the signs emerging from Vienna, where negotiations have been taking place, are that a final deal will not be agreed by Monday. Moreover, European leaders are said to be increasingly disillusioned with the American determination to grant more concessions to entice Iran into a deal, adding yet another layer of complexity to the deliberations.

Both US Secretary of State John Kerry and French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius will return to Paris later today for what Reuters described as “consultations.” Earlier reports that Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif was planning to leave Vienna for Tehran turned out to be false, with Iranian negotiators subsequently confirming that “the talks will continue.”

The obstacles to any deal are well-known, and little progress has been made to bridge the gaps between the two sides, despite the enthusiasm of the Obama Administration for a deal. Major powers in the shape of the P5+1 – the five permanent members of the UN Security Council and Germany – want Iran to reduce its number of centrifuges from the 19,000 currently in operation to 4,500, in order to delay Iran’s accumulation of the fissile material that would enable a nuclear weapon.

The Iranians are unhappy with the degree and timing of sanctions relief, insisting that sanctions should be terminated immediately rather than incrementally.

Nor is there agreement over the duration of any deal. The P5+1 is said to be looking for a 20 year deal, while the Iranians want something much shorter.

Domestic considerations are also coming to the fore, particularly in the United States, where unease with both the substance of any deal, and the possibility that President Obama will bypass Congress to secure it, is growing among legislators as well as the American public. “We did some polling last week, which we’ve not yet publicly released, which shows that 7 out of 10 Americans want Congressional approval of a deal,” said Josh Block, the President of The Israel Project, an Washington-DC based advocacy group, who is in Vienna monitoring the talks.

Western states are hardly in lockstep. The British government has sounded distinctly pessimistic that a deal is within reach, while Kerry is said to be anxious that the French government will not support a deal, having been unsuccessful in his earlier attempt to secure an undertaking from Fabius that no last minute objections would surface.

“There was a meeting in Vienna today of the French and British Foreign Ministers and the US Secretary of State which was described to me as ‘frosty,’” Block said. “That leads me to believe that the French and maybe the British will adopt a harder line than the Americans.”

The French, Block explained, have “fundamental objections” to nuclear proliferation in the Middle East and want to avoid a deal that would cause non-nuclear states in the region to embark on nuclear programs.

Back in Washington, DC, Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill) has said that he will “definitely” reintroduce sanctions legislation on Iran in the next Congress.

“I think the Republicans will definitely bring it up. It’s a movie we’re going to see again,” Kirk said on Capitol Hill. “The Republican majority will be working with [Sen. Mitch McConnell – R-KY] about when the time is to come up for a vote on that.”

President Obama will also have to keep a close eye on those Democratic Party legislators who will refuse to back a deal that does not explicitly prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon. Last year, 16 Democrats led by Sen. Robert Menendez (D-NJ) joined the 59 co-sponsors of a bill to impose tough new sanctions on Iran in the event of a failed deal, but the legislation was blocked by outgoing Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV).

Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) today released a statement declaring, “Along with my colleagues, who authored the bipartisan sanctions law that brought the Iranians to the negotiating table, I wish negotiations to succeed. But the success of negotiations can only be defined as an agreement that removes the threat of a world with a nuclear Iran.”

“Unless Iran is willing to agree to a final deal that prevents it from building, developing or acquiring a nuclear weapon, we should not allow any relaxation of sanctions,” Schumer said.

Categories: Iran, Iranian nukes, Kerry, Nukes, P5+1
Tags: Iran, Iranian nukes, Nukes

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Hamas, Abbas, Obama and Islamic savagery

November 18, 2014

Hamas, Abbas, Obama and Islamic savagery, Dan Miller’s Blog, November 18, 2014

Today Palestinian ~~extremists~~ Islamists murdered four Israelis, three of whom were also U.S. citizens, at a Jerusalem synagogue. Several others are in critical condition. Palestinians celebrated their actions and their intended consequences.

This morning I posted an article by Robert Spencer of Front Page Magazine titled More Beheadings, More Denial at Warsclerotic, of which I am an editor. Mr. Spencer’s article deals with Obama’s response to the recent Islamic beheading of “Abdul-Rahman Kassig, previously known as Peter.” Obama proclaimed that Kassig’s beheading by personnel of the Islamic State “represent no faith, least of all the Muslim faith.” As I noted in a parenthetical comment at the top of the article,

(Please see also this article, and others, on today’s Islamic slaughter at a Jerusalem synagogue. “Knives, axes and guns” were used.” Hamas responded with praise for the terrorists who did it. Will Obama, our Islamic “scholar” in chief, declare that such Palestinian “actions represent no faith, least of all the Muslim faith?” He won’t. Nor, of course, will he admit that the Palestinian’s Islamic actions, like those of the Islamic State, do represent Islam.– DM)

Mr. Spencer observed that Islamic savagery comparable to that of the Islamic State could happen in the United States and that

It could happen anywhere that people read the phrase “when you meet the unbelievers, strike the necks” (Qur’an 47:4) as if it were a command of the Creator of the Universe. But to point out that simple and obvious fact nowadays only brings down upon one’s head charges of “hatred” and of “demonizing all Muslims,” when in a sane society it would bring honest explanations from Muslims of good will of what they were doing to ensure that no Muslim ever acted on that verse’s literal meaning. [Emphasis added.]

Here’s a pertinent video by Pat Condell:

Continuing with the quotation from Mr. Spencer,

In reality, they’re doing nothing. No Muslim organization, mosque or school in the United States has any program to teach young Muslims and converts to Islam why they should avoid and reject on Islamic grounds the vision of Islam – and of unbelievers – that the Islamic State and other jihad groups offer them. This is extremely strange, given the fact that all the Muslim organizations, mosques and schools in the United States ostensibly reject this understanding of Islam. And even stranger is that no American authorities seem to have noticed the absence of such initiatives, much less dared to call out Muslim groups about this. [Emphasis added.]

On the contrary, instead of calling on Muslim groups to take some action to prevent this kind of thing from happening in the future, Obama’s latest denial was even more strenuous in its dissociation of the beheading from Islam: “ISIL’s actions represent no faith, least of all the Muslim faith which Abdul-Rahman adopted as his own.” [Emphasis added.]

“Least of all”! As if it were possible that the Islamic State’s actions represented Buddhism, or Methodism, or Christian Science, or the Hardshell Baptists, or the Mandaeans, to greater or lesser degrees, but the most far-fetched association one could make, out of all the myriad faiths people hold throughout the world, would be to associate the Islamic State’s actions with…Islam. The Islamic State’s actions represent no faith, least of all Islam – as if it were more likely that the Islamic State were made up of Presbyterians or Lubavitcher Hasidim or Jains or Smartas than that it were made up of Muslims.

Here’s a video of Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a former Muslim, speaking at Yale University on September 15th. Although more than an hour long, it’s well worth watching and considering. Please see also this article, commenting on her background and views of Islam.

Is Jonathan Gruber still advising Obama? This video is from left-leaning(?) MSNBC.

Did Obama “steal” His notions about Islam from Gruber, or merely Gruber’s tactics for masking His true beliefs and intentions, this time about Islam rather than about ObamaCare? Did Obama arrive at His notions of Islam and how to present them Himself, based on His own Islamic studies — particularly the propriety of lying to non-Muslims on behalf of Islam? Or is He, again, just sucking up to Iran? In the latter connection, please see this semi-satirical post titled To get a nuke deal with Iran Obama and the Islamist world demonize Israel.

The Israeli-Palestinian “peace” process and the “two state solution.”

For years, the Obama Administration has been pushing Israel, hard, to agree to a two state solution with the “moderate” Palestinian Authority (Fatah). Hamas is the Palestinian entity which, in April of this year, formed a quasi-unified government with the Palestinian Authority under Mahmoud Abbas. Fatah’s alleged moderation, and that of Abbas, is of this type:

Abbas is seventy-nine years old and probably will not last much longer. He has personally encouraged terrorism, most recently when commenting on the killing of a Palestinian, Mutaz Hijazi, who attempted to assassinate Yehuda Glick, an advocate of Jewish prayer on the Temple Mount.

Hijazi was quickly found and killed by Israeli security forces. Abbas responded by promptly writing to his widow:

With anger, we have received the news of the vicious assassination crime committed by the terrorists of the Israeli occupation army against [your] son Mu’taz Ibrahim Khalil Hijazi, who will go to heaven as a martyr defending the rights of our people and its holy places.

Hijazi, it should be stressed, shot Glick, a civilian, at pointblank range. Fortunately Glick now appears to be recovering in hospital.

The assassin’s admirer, Mahmoud Abbas, is the same Mahmoud Abbas about whom President Barack Obama said last March:

I think nobody would dispute that whatever disagreements you may have with him, he has proven himself to be somebody who has been committed to nonviolence and diplomatic efforts to resolve this issue. [Emphasis added.]

That was in an interview where Obama, of course, portrayed Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu as the recalcitrant party who needs to “seize the moment” and make peace.

Even if Abbas wanted to reject Islamic terrorism, doing so would be akin to signing his own death warrant.

In a speech in Ramallah on November 11, marking the tenth anniversary of the death of his predecessor, Yasser Arafat, Abbas declared: “He who surrenders one grain of the soil of Palestine and Jerusalem is not one of us.”

This statement alone should be enough for Kerry and Western leaders to realize that it would be impossible to ask Abbas to make any concessions. Like Arafat, Abbas has become hostage to his own rhetoric. How can Abbas be expected to accept any deal that does not include 100% of his demands — in this instance, all territory captured by Israel in 1967? [Emphasis added.]

Abbas himself knows that if he comes back with 97% or 98% of his demands, his people will either spit in is face or kill him, after accusing him of being a “defeatist” and “relinquishing Palestinian rights.”

Abbas was elected for a five year term as President of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) on November 11, 2004, until January 9, 2009. However,

due to Palestinian Internal conflict he unilaterally extended his term for another year and continues in office even years after that second deadline expired. As a result of this, Fatah’s main rival, Hamas announced that it would not recognise the extension or view Abbas as rightful president.^[6]^[7]^[8] [Emphasis added.]

For these and many other reasons, a “two state solution” would ultimately pit Israel and Hamas against either other, more so even that presently. It would result in either the death of Israel — the only free and democratic state in the region — or the death of the Palestinian state notion. The United States should agree with Israel that the death of the Palestinian state notion is preferable to the death of Israel. There is no apparent reason to assume, or even to hope, that Obama does.

On a lighter note, this might be better than a two state solution but, due to regional demographics and Israel’s dedication to democracy, would not work either.

Categories: Abbas, Fatah, Gaza, Hamas, Iran, Islam, Islamic State, Israel, Israel, Palestinians, Jerusalem, Kerry, Netanyahu, Nukes, Obama, Two state solution
Tags: Abbas, Hamas, Iran, Islam, Islamic State, Israel, Nukes, Two state solution

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[Satire] Iran’s Letter to Obama: Thanks for the Nukes!

November 15, 2014

Iran’s Letter to Obama: Thanks for the Nukes! Israel Today, Noah Beck, November 14, 2014

131015_iran

Dear President Obama,

You’ve been a great friend for the last six years and, to express our appreciation, we’d like to acknowledge some of your many helpful actions:

1) In 2009, our presidential election results were so dubious that millions of brave, pro-democracy protesters risked their lives to demonstrate throughout our country. When our Basij paramilitary force brutalized them, you kept your response irrelevantly mild for the sake of “engaging” us. That surely helped Iranians understand the risks of protesting our “free” election of 2012 (involving our eight handpicked candidates). It was indeed a very orderly rubberstamp.

2) After eight years of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, we KNEW you’d fall for the smiles of his successor, President Hassan Rouhani! Human rights abuses have actually worsened under his rule and his polished charm only makes him better at duping the world into acquiescing to our nukes, so we LOVE how you’ve overlooked these facts.

3) You’ve been unilaterally weakening the sanctions against us by simply not enforcing them (which reassures us that you’re desperate to avoid any real confrontation).

4) You’ve threatened to thwart any Congressional attempt to limit your nuclear generosity by simply lifting sanctions without Congressional approval. Good stuff!

5) You isolated Israel on the issue of how close we are to a nuclear capability – we love how your estimates are so much laxer than theirs are!

6) The diplomatic snubs and betrayals of Israel by your administration have been EPIC. We couldn’t have asked for more – from your humiliation of Prime Minister Netanyahu in 2010, to Secretary of State John Kerry’s betrayal of Israel during Operation Protective Edge, to calling Netanyahu a “chickenshit” a few weeks ago, without even apologizing later. We found it hilariously ironic that your administration’s accusation of Israeli cowardice was made anonymously! And, FYI, Netanyahu is actually the only leader in the world with the guts to defy us, respond to Syrian border violations, enforce his own declared lines, etc., so we thought that this was particularly priceless.

7) Speaking of enforcing red lines, we LOVE how you backed off yours, after our Syrian buddy, Basher Assad, used chemical weapons on his own people. That was a very helpful signal to everyone that we need not take your threats too seriously (contrary to those scary words you issued in 2012 about how stopping our nukes militarily was still an option, unlike containment, and how you don’t bluff). But we understood back then that you were trying to get re-elected, so we didn’t take it personally.

8) It was adorably naive of you (in 2011) to request so politely that we give back your drone that went down on Iranian soil. In fact, your request was so quaint that we couldn’t resist recently showcasing our knock-off based on that drone.

9) Fortunately, you don’t take our Supreme Leader Khamenei seriously when he tweets out his plan for destroying Israel (why let our true motives get in the way of a fantastic nuclear deal, right)?

10) We LOVE how you obsess over Israel building apartments in Jerusalem because it’s the perfect distraction from our deal.

11) You’ve been pressuring Israel to retreat from more disputed territory, effectively rewarding Palestinians for launching the third missile war against Israel from Gaza in five years last summer and, more recently, the third Intifidah inside Israel in 17 years. You’re almost as awesome as the European appeasers who think Palestinian bellicosity merits statehood!

12) It’s so cute of you to write us these letters asking for help against ISIS and showing us how desperately you want a nuclear deal. All we had to do was hint at an ISIS-for-nukes exchange and you got so excited!

13) You’re smart to go behind everyone’s backs when dealing with us. That’s a bummer that your top aide, Ben Rhodes, was caught saying how a nuclear accord with us is as important to you as “healthcare.” But we’ve got the perfect slogan to sell our deal to Americans: “If you like your nukes, you can keep them.”

14) What’s really awesome about the deal that we’re “negotiating” is that it allows us to continue nuclear enrichment but makes it even harder for Israel to take any military action against our nuclear program. And our agreement will give the press even more ammunition against such an attack. We already know about the world media’s anti-Israel bias – they can’t even get a simple story about vehicular terrorism against Israelis correct. Even we were surprised at how The Guardian writes accurate headlines when Canada suffers an Islamist car attack but not when Israel does). So if you accept our nukes and Israel then attacks them, the media will be even harsher on Israel (even though the world will be silently relieved, if Israeli courage succeeds at neutralizing what scared everyone else).

But we kind of feel sorry for you, because nobody takes you seriously and you’re a lame duck now. Putin is unabashedly conquering neighboring countries while going all Cold War on you with 40 provocative security incidents involving Western nations and Russian flights into the Gulf of Mexico (despite your promise of greater flexibility after your 2012 reelection). The North Koreans are closer than ever to building nuclear missiles. China is dangerously testing disputed borders with India, growing increasingly assertive in the contested Spratly archipelago, and stealing your sensitive defense and corporate data. Oh, and ISIS has grown into a veritable jihadi lovefest thanks to your excellent strategy against them.

Indeed, your foreign policy seems like a massive FAIL, but we’re super ready to help! Your trusted Russian friends have suggested continuing our nuclear talks past the November 24th deadline, and we’re totally down with more enrichment time (that’s another reason we’ve stonewalled the IAEA’s investigations into our nukes), so count us in on this extension like the one from last July (and any future ones). Hey, it’s good for you too: an extension (or agreement) looks so much better than calling out our manipulations and issuing more empty threats to stop us, right?

And after everyone sees the killer deal that you’re giving us, the world’s bad actors will line up to talk to you, with demands of their own that you can try to satisfy in the hope that they’ll stop opposing your national interests so much.

Overall, we appreciate you even more than we did President Carter, because getting nukes is WAY COOLER than holding 52 American diplomats and citizens hostage for 444 days.

With our deepest gratitude,

Your Friends in the Iranian Regime

p.s. We’re glad you didn’t take any personal offense when one of our officials used the N-word to describe you back in 2010. He actually has nothing but respect for you, as do we.

Noah Beck is the author of The Last Israelis, an apocalyptic novel about Iranian nukes and other geopolitical issues in the Middle East.

Categories: Humor, Iran, Islamic State, Israel, Middle East, Netanyahu, Nukes, Obama, P5+1, Palestinians, Rouhani, Supreme Leader
Tags: Iran, Islamic State, Israel, Netanyahu, Nukes, Palestinians, Supreme leader

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Obama desperate for a deal with Iran

November 14, 2014

Obama desperate for a deal with Iran, Israel Hayom, Isi Leibler, November 14, 2014

(Is Obama getting advice from Mr. Gruber on how to lie effectively to the “stupid” American public? Please see also To get a nuke deal with Iran Obama and the Islamist world demonize Israel.– DM)

[T]he administration continues to grovel in an effort to appease the Iranians. It is widely believed that the unprecedented hostility recently directed against Israel, especially the statement that Israel had lost the opportunity of exploiting the military option to prevent Iran becoming a nuclear power, was primarily for the benefit of Khamenei.

Under pressure, following the public release of his letter to Khamenei, Obama has stepped back, stating that there is still a big gap and that “we may not be able to get there.” He added, “Our number one priority with respect to Iran is making sure they don’t get a nuclear weapon.” Even Obama’s closest associates would question their president’s credibility when he voices such statements.

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Despite statements to the contrary, the Obama administration appears determined to achieve an “agreement” with Iran and seems willing to breach its repeated undertakings that it would never countenance Iran becoming a nuclear power. With the mullahs’ increased intransigence as they sense the desperation of the Americans to avoid a confrontation, the Nov. 24 deadline will probably be extended, enabling the centrifuges to continue spinning while the P5+1 countries engage in fruitless negotiations with the duplicitous Iranians.

The Iranians have mocked Secretary of State John Kerry’s overtures, including his secret appeals to them to coordinate with the U.S. in opposing the Islamic State group. Speaking from a podium bedecked with banners blazing “America cannot do a damn thing,” Ayatollah Ali Khamenei boasted that the “Great Satan’s” efforts to bring Iran to its knees had failed, and that U.S. President Barack Obama lacked the courage for a military confrontation. Ali Younesi, senior adviser to “moderate” President Hassan Rouhani, referred to Obama as “the weakest of U.S. presidents,” whose six years in office were “humiliating.”

Nevertheless, the administration continues to grovel in an effort to appease the Iranians. It is widely believed that the unprecedented hostility recently directed against Israel, especially the statement that Israel had lost the opportunity of exploiting the military option to prevent Iran becoming a nuclear power, was primarily for the benefit of Khamenei.

The London Times claimed that American and Iranian officials have even been discussing the opening of a U.S. trade office in Tehran.

The frenzied, initially covert, efforts to engage the support of Iran in the struggle against Islamic State — despite Iran being designated by the U.S. as a terrorist state — has further undermined the little credibility the U.S. retains with the moderate Sunni states, considered until recently as staunch allies.

Obama’s deception of his allies was further exemplified when it was disclosed that he had written a secret letter to Khamenei pleading with him to reach an accommodation. This, the fourth letter he had written to the ayatollah — all of which were ignored — was an explicit breach of undertaking to his allies that any independent initiatives would be preceded by consultations.

Even one of Obama’s favorite in-house journalists, Jeffrey Goldberg, felt impelled to remark that the “most recent letter was delivered at an unfortunate moment in the run-up to the putatively climactic negotiations between Iran and the world powers” when the Obama administration had already conceded many of Iran’s demands. Goldberg concluded his column by stating: “The Iranians originally came to the negotiating table because U.S.-led sanctions were hurting them badly. I understand the need for give and take negotiations, but I’m getting worried that the U.S. is focused too much on the first half of that equation.”

The U.S. administration has already given approval to Iran to enrich uranium, effectively making it a nuclear threshold state. While the global powers agreed to enable the Iranians to have 1,000 centrifuges to process material required to create nuclear fuel, the Iranians have outrightly refused to dismantle any of the 19,000 centrifuges they have already accumulated. It is understood that Iran is already in the position to accrue sufficient enriched fissile material to become a nuclear power within a few months, if it so desires. The U.S. has indicated that it would be willing to sign off on a deal that would extend this breakout phase to one year, hardly reassuring to the region.

The Iranians also displayed utter contempt toward the U.S. by violating the interim accord and failing to disclose an enrichment facility in Qom and even denying access to inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency to military sites and nuclear scientists engaged in research. Clearly, the duplicitous Islamist regime would continue to circumvent any agreement that is not rigorously monitored and enforced — a procedure that the Iranians have already made clear they will never accept.

While the outcome of this issue will have immense global implications, especially in the Middle East, Israel is the country most affected. The Iranian regime’s hatred of Israel is messianic. It openly proclaims its commitment to destroy the Jewish state. Coinciding with Obama’s groveling letter to him, Khamenei tweeted a message stating that the only way to stop the “Israeli crimes” was to “annihilate” the “barbaric, wolflike & infanticidal regime of #Israel.”

Israel cannot accept the prospect of such a fanatical terrorist regime becoming a nuclear threshold state.

Under pressure, following the public release of his letter to Khamenei, Obama has stepped back, stating that there is still a big gap and that “we may not be able to get there.” He added, “Our number one priority with respect to Iran is making sure they don’t get a nuclear weapon.” Even Obama’s closest associates would question their president’s credibility when he voices such statements.

The question is whether at this advanced stage, the P5+1 nations, desperate to appease and reach an accord with the terrorist state at any price, can still be deterred from capitulating.

The key rests with the United States. The extraordinary landslide victory by the Republicans at the midterm elections — clearly a vote of no confidence in Obama — provides some hope.

Yet it should be noted that within the American political system, the president has primary control of foreign relations.

The Republican-controlled Congress and Senate can certainly pass resolutions, but that will not necessarily limit the White House in this arena of foreign policy. In addition, realizing that on the domestic scene his hands will be restricted by Congress, Obama might even decide to intensify his foreign policy activities. The principal areas are likely to include the embrace of the Iranians and possibly trying to impose a settlement on the Israelis with the Palestinians.

However, in relation to Iran, the president must persuade Congress to rescind the sanctions it originally legislated. Obama may constitutionally override the congressional sanctions and unilaterally suspend enforcement, but that could lead to a major confrontation with Congress.

Needless to say, if a reasonable agreement is achieved, it will be endorsed by Congress. But all indications suggest that Obama is promoting an Alice-in-Wonderland deal with the Iranians, which Congress should reject.

The incoming Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has already stated unequivocally that the Senate will review any deal with Iran and ensure that “any comprehensive agreement concerning the Iranian nuclear program, both protects the national security of the United States and recognizes Israel’s own defense as a security partner of our country.”

At this critical time, American Jews and friends of Israel should exert all their influence to convince the administration and a bipartisan Congress that appeasing the Iranian mullahs will have horrific long-term consequences and must be avoided. They should mount a powerful public campaign to demonstrate the extent of the catastrophe the government would cause should it appease this evil terrorist regime, which in the absence of becoming a nuclear state, is likely in time to implode because of the growing opposition from its own young people and the middle class.

If the current U.S. desperation to avoid a confrontation enables the Iranian terrorist state to achieve a nuclear threshold level, it is likely to have far worse long-term global repercussions than Chamberlain’s appeasement of the Nazis at Munich which led to World War ll.

Categories: Iran, Iranian nukes, Israel, Obama, P5+1
Tags: Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran, Israel, Nukes

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To get a nuke deal with Iran Obama and the Islamist world demonize Israel

November 13, 2014

To get a nuke deal with Iran Obama and the Islamist world demonize Israel, Dan Miller’s Blog, Dan Miller, November 13, 2014

This is a guest post by Imam Mohamed allah-Dork, chairman of the Washington Islamist Coalition for Peace and Prosperity (WICPAP). Although it might appear to be satire it is not, because he articulates, far more candidly than most, the objectives of the “progressive” Obama Administration. I found him with the assistance of (another) imaginary “friend,” the Highly Honorable Ima Librul, Senator from the Great State of ~~Confusion~~ Utopia, where happy unicorns frolic endlessly in the service of Obama.

********************

Hatred of Israel is among our Dear Leader Obama’s most effective weapons against those who oppose Iran’s nuclear ambitions. He has made heroic efforts to encourage and use it, with help from the progressive media and His other friends.

Because of the wise efforts of Our Dear Leader and His brilliant Secretary of State, hatred of Israel has increased in recent years. This has been due, in large part, to Israel’s continuing and patently unreasonable refusals to commit national suicide by agreeing to all of the righteous demands of Palestinian Authority President Abbas, as Obama and Kerry have also demanded. Peaceful Palestinians have responded to Israel’s malicious refusals through non-violent protests resulting in the death or injury of Jewish terrorists, accidentally run over, stabbed or shot.

Israeli Terrorists

Jewish Terrorists

The beautiful song embedded above was recently augmented by a new Palestinian musical offering including wholesome family-oriented lyrics.

I am so proud of the composers, singers and musicians that I cry whenever I watch the video!

According to a specious article at a right-wing propaganda site called PJ Media,

What has evoked this enthusiasm is a spate of murderous Palestinian attacks on Israelis over the past few weeks. The fatalities have been a three-month-old Israeli girl and a 22-year-old Ecuadorian woman, both killed in a car-ramming attack in Jerusalem; a 38-year-old Israeli Druze border patrol captain killed in another car-ramming attack in Jerusalem; a 20-year-old off-duty Israeli soldier stabbed to death in Tel Aviv on Monday; and a 26-year-old Israeli woman stabbed to death beside a Judea community that same day.

That is absurd. They were no more “murdered,” than are filthy dogs which are righteously slaughtered because they are dangers to society at large.

Unless Israel’s refusal to commit national suicide is condemned world-wide, undue attention will focus on the peace loving Islamic Republic of Iran and its legitimate goal of having nuclear weapons to bring Islamic peace to all who desire it. Israel opposes Iran’s quest for Islamic peace through nukes and therefore selfishly rejects it.

Hatred is irrational and bad, except that directed at genocidal, apartheid Israel and others who fail to embrace Islam. Hatred of them is rational and good. Just as hatred of Israel must be encouraged to the extent possible, so must the ~~stupidity~~ great credulity of the American people be fed and used for Progressive purposes, as it was fed and used to give them the blessings of superior health care.

Lies, obfuscation and secrecy for good purposes as praised by our Dear Leader’s consultant Jonathan Gruber, such as the passage of ObamaCare, are good because they are necessary. Leading the way, our Dear Leader promised to have the most transparent administration in history.

It was all diversionary symbolism, of course, because truth, clarity, transparency and accountability in pursuit of bad objectives — such as defeat of our Dear Leader’s policies — are intolerable because it is racist to oppose Him. Also, they might succeed.

That brings us to our Dear Leader’s dominant role in the P5+1 negotiations with The Islamic Republic of Peace Everlasting, Iran.

Some warmongering, racist Neanderthals blither that On Iran, No One Can Afford to Be Wilfully Blind.

It is more than simply unfortunate that Western policymakers look at Iran and appear to see only what they want to see. They heap praise on progress in the nuclear negotiations without looking at the actual content. They tune into televised smiles and reasonable-sounding public statements from the Rouhani administration and tune out the bombastic threats, insults and anti-Western rhetoric that invariably accompanies them. They push for large-scale rapprochement with Iran on the apparent assumption that its crimes will disappear if we somehow pretend they don’t exist. [Emphasis added.]

But these wishful thinkers are in the corridors of power in Washington and Westminster. Although ISIS has grown stronger thanks to the sectarian conflict that Iran has helped create, these unrealistic optimists would imply that somehow Iran is our best hope for defeating this menace. So they give in to Iranian intransigence in the nuclear talks by senselessly giving away more and more leverage. [Emphasis added.]

Make no mistake, Tehran’s theocratic rulers are very well aware of this “pie-in-the-sky” illogicality. Indeed, they are counting on it. The regime’s officials are so confident in our diplomatic vulnerability that they have been trying to use the crisis in Iraq not only to obtain unearned concessions in the nuclear domain, but also to pressure the U.S., the U.K. and their allies to modify their stance against the dictatorship of Bashar Assad in Syria. [Emphasis added.]

Nonsense! Iran needs nuclear weapons to pursue its peaceful, humanitarian goals and, with our Dear Leader’s help, will get (or keep) them! Life will then be better for everyone who matters.

No deal with Iran will be finalized unless all of Iran’s righteous demands are met. Unless ample lies and obfuscations are spoon-fed to the American public to minimize the consequences of Iran’s victory, the deal may well be opposed. Lies and obfuscation were needed to pass ObamaCare, even with solid Democrat majorities in both houses of Congress. A deal with Iran is even more important. Our Dear Leader’s wise consultant, Jonathan Gruber, knows this very well and so does our Dear Leader.

Fortunately, a Washington think tank is taking the lead to counter the silly stuff spouted by racists.

A leading liberal think tank in Washington, D.C., has begun enlisting its associates in an “all-hands-on-deck effort to support” the Obama administration as it seeks to ink a nuclear deal with Iran by the end of the month, according to emails obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.

The Truman National Security Project, a nonprofit think tank with ties to the administration, is assembling a “crack team of writers” to flood national and local media outlets with articles supporting the White House’s efforts before the details of a final nuclear deal have even emerged, according to internal emails sent by the organization to its listserv. [Emphasis added.]

“Our community absolutely must step up and not cede the public narrative to neocon hawks that would send our country to war just to screw the president,” Graham F. West, Truman’s writing and communications associate, wrote in a recent email to the organization’s listserv. [Emphasis added.]

Pay no attention to insane mumblings by the editor of this subversive blog. He has long opposed what he refers to as the Iran Scam and recently wrote this racist diatribe against our own Dear Leader and His quest for peace everlasting. If this sick cartoon isn’t racist, then I don’t know what is.

Our Dear Leader has already accomplished countless wonderful things to establish His magnificent legacy. Here are just a few:

He is the first African American President of the United States.

The award of His Nobel Peace Prize on October 9, 2009, a mere nine months after He became the President of the United States. No other President has accomplished that.

He compelled passage of the Affordable Care Act during His first term in office.

He has already issued more crucial executive decrees than any former President.

He has consistently condemned the apartheid, illegitimate state known as Israel.

Miller even contends, speciously, that Iran’s alleged human rights abuses and alleged support for world-wide terrorism should be considered by the esteemed P5+1 negotiators under our Dear Leader’s helpful guidance. That, like all of his other suggestions, would elevate facts, transparency and accountability for a bad purpose over lies, obfuscation and non-accountability for a good purpose. What great sage once wrote “the truth shall make you flee?” He was right. Truth would make many Americans flee from a deal with Iran, and we need their unthinking support to show that, despite recent election results, they reject racism and therefore still love, respect and have unbounded confidence in our Dear Leader.

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Editor’s comments

In an effort to help Imam Mohamed allah-Dork present his ideas most candidly and therefore effectively, I was pleased to provide the You Tube videos.

I agree with allah-Dork’s thesis that lies and obfuscation are as necessary to secure public approval of a nuke deal with Iran as they were to secure passage of ObamaCare. A nuke deal with Iran would be even worse than ObamaCare.

It will be very difficult, if not impossible, for Congress to repeal ObamaCare outright if for no reason other than that Obama would veto any bill repealing it. However, it is possible that the Supreme Court may deal ObamaCare a fatal blow if it finds that subsidies for customers of ObamaCare exchanges were clearly intended, and stated by the Congress, to be available only for customers of State, not Federal, exchanges.

Once Iran gets (or keeps) nukes, there will be no way for Congress to repeal the agreement, no way for the Supreme Court to overrule it and no way to force Iran to get rid of its nukes. That Iran may get rid of some of them voluntarily — by using them — offers no comfort at all.

Israel, the only free and democratic nation in the Middle East, has served as a useful distraction from the violation of even the most basic of human rights throughout the rest of the region. She continues to respect and implement those rights despite the Obama Administration’s increasing rejection of them and its refusal to take them into account when dealing with other nations. Iran is perhaps the worst human rights violator in the region as well as the most prolific sponsor of Islamic terrorism. As the Obama Administration ignores blatant human rights violations by other nations, it fantasizes that Israel is a gross violator and amplifies its fantasies at every opportunity.

Obama and His cohorts have learned the lessons taught by Mr. Gruber very well and have used them with success. Here is an excerpt from an article by Jonathan Turley, a liberal in the old fashioned sense of the word. He has often supported the ends which Obama has sought to achieve while opposing the methods He has used and continues to use.

In fairness to Gruber, he is again being honest about what happened in the passage of ACA and speaking as an academic. However, such machinations are rarely confirmed by high-level consultants or officials. The ACA was pushed through by a muscle vote on a handful of votes while the Administration made claims that he later had to admit were misleading at best, such as the President’s repeated assurance that citizens could keep your current insurance policy if you liked it. There was a great deal of cynicism and misleading representations made during the ACA debates — reflecting a deep-seated contempt for the intelligence of the American voter. Gruber however seems to celebrate the success in using what he viewed as the stupidity of citizens, to quote his earlier comments, to secure passage of the ACA. It is the triumph of the ends over the means — the mantra of Beltway denizens who view more principled actors as naive chumps. What is shocking for many outside of the Beltway is of course the moral relativism and cynicism reflected in such comments, but Gruber is the norm in Washington. He is the face of the consequentiality morality that has long governed this city. [Emphasis added.]

What is different is that he admits it.

Obama, et al, have consistently applied Gruber principles to the Iran Scam and will continue to do so in seeking public support for any nuke deal with Iran. They will also continue to obfuscate and lie about the Israeli situation to distract attention from what they are doing, relying on their perceptions of the “stupidity” of the American public.

Categories: Antisemitism, Gaza, Hamas, Iran, Iranian nukes, Islamism, Israel, Israel, Palestinians, Jerusalem, Jewish occupation of Israel, Kerry, Middle East, Nukes, Obama, P5+1, Palestinians, Rouhani
Tags: Iran, Islam, Israel, Nukes

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Obama: OK, I agree to whatever deal YOU want

November 9, 2014

Obama: OK, I agree to whatever deal YOU want, Dan Miller’s Blog, November 9, 2014
No, not with His domestic enemies in the next Congress. He desperately wants a deal, any deal, with Iran.

Obama intends to grant Royal amnesty for millions of illegals currently present in our nation, regardless of the adverse economic and social impacts and Republican warnings. I opined here on what He will likely do and on the unfortunately poor prospects for any Republican efforts to thwart it.

Remember “Leg Tingles?” The tingle has gone, at least temporarily

So much for deal making with the opposition.

However, Obama is anxious to have a deal — any deal — with Iran very soon.

Although He will not make a deal with His domestic enemies whose voters rejected Him and His policies on November 4th, Obama is apparently so infatuated with His need for a legacy that He continues to push for a nuke deal with Iran. Any deal will do, no matter how disastrous it will be. Obama’s protestations to the contrary are consistent with “if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor,” “if you like your medical insurance policy you can keep it,” “My administration will be the most transparent in history” and a multitude of others.

A deal with Iran needs to be signed, sealed and delivered well before the next Congress convenes in January. Hence the importance of meeting the November 24th deadline or extending it for the minimum time needed for Iran to demand, and for Him to make, more concessions.

Iran continues to hang tough and Obama continues to seek accommodation from Iran so that He can have a legacy. Obama dispatched a letter to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei last month.

The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday that, according to people briefed on the letter, Obama wrote to Khamenei in the middle of last month and stressed that any cooperation on dealing with the Islamic State, or ISIS, was tied to Iran striking a deal over its nuclear program. The U.S., Iran and other negotiators are facing a Nov. 24 deadline for such a deal. [Emphasis added.]

. . . .

Asked about the reported letter, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest would not confirm the report.

“I’m not in a position to discuss private correspondence between the president and any world leader,” he said.

However, he said the U.S. policy toward Iran “remains unchanged.”

In an article at Commentary Magazine titled White House Ignores Khamenei Response to Letters, Michael Rubin wrote that contrary to reports that Khamenei did not respond,

Actually, Khamenei did respond. On the 30th anniversary of the seizure of the U.S. Embassy, he said this, in a mocking tone which is even more apparent in the Persian version of this speech:

The new US President made some beautiful comments. He also repeatedly asked us in writing and orally to turn a new page and help him change the present situation. He asked us to cooperate with him to solve global issues. He went as far as that.

Now, Khamenei continued to say he gave Obama a chance, but Obama didn’t come around. Khamenei then gloated about the strength of the Islamic Republic, a perception which Obama’s groveling tone has bolstered:

I wonder why they do not learn a lesson from what has happened. I do not understand why they are not prepared to get to know our nation. Do they not know that this nation is the one that resisted and brought the two superpowers – that is, the Soviet Union and America – to their knees? When there were two superpowers in the world, they were opposed to one another in almost all areas except in their enmity towards the Islamic Republic. This enmity was the only thing these two superpowers had in common. Why do you not learn your lesson? Today you are not even as powerful as you used to be. The Islamic Republic is several times more powerful today than those days, and yet you are speaking with the same tone? That is arrogance – talking to a nation arrogantly and using threats to get what they want. They threaten us. And our nation says it will resist.

Khamenei then warned the United States not to put its hope in reformers, as Obama seems keen to do:

Just because a handful of naïve or malevolent individuals have confronted the Islamic Republic does not mean that they can roll out the red carpet for Americans in our country. These individuals either had ulterior motives or had naively misunderstood the events without having very bad intentions – I do not want to be judgmental about their malevolence. Americans should know that the nation is resisting firmly.

Despite the very substantial concessions which Obama has already granted, Khamenei’s remarks seem to amount to this: give me whatever else I demand or shove your legacy up your scrawny apostate ass.

It was reported on November 8th that

Ali Akbar Velayati, longtime foreign policy adviser to Khamenei and a former Iranian foreign minister, may join the talks between US Secretary of State John Kerry, Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and European Union negotiator Catherine Ashton, in a signal that the Supreme Leader may be preparing to sign off on a deal, sources told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity. [Emphasis added.]

. . . .

The meeting between Kerry, Zarif and Ashton is due to get underway Nov. 9 in Muscat, Oman, which hosted secret US-Iran talks that helped lead to reaching the interim Iran nuclear deal last year. Following the two-day US/Iran/EU trilateral meeting Nov. 9-10, negotiators from the rest of the P5+1 — the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany — are supposed to join the talks in Oman for a Nov. 11 meeting. Another, possibly final, round of P5+1 Iran talks is due to be held in Vienna from Nov. 18 to 24.

US, Iranian and Russian negotiators say there is still more work to be done, but are expressing increasing, albeit cautious, optimism that a deal is within reach.

The November 24, 2013 P5+1 Interim deal was and remains a scam

In January of this year, I wrote about Obama’s Iran Scam, structured from the beginning in Iran’s favor by legitimizing Iran’s Uranium enrichment and effectively eliminating consideration by the P5+1 negotiators of Iran’s past and continuing efforts to militarize nuclear weapons. The January 16, 2014 White House Summary of the arrangement states,

Iran committed in the Joint Plan of Action to provide increased and unprecedented transparency into its nuclear program, including through more frequent and intrusive inspections as well as expanded provision of information to the IAEA. [Emphasis added.]

Will Iran’s “unprecedented transparency” be similar to that which Obama claimed for His administration? Or the versions of transparency He delivered?

Continuing with the White House Summary,

The Iranian enrichment facilities at Natanz and Fordow will now be subject to daily IAEA inspector access as set out in the Joint Plan of Action (as opposed to every few weeks). The IAEA and Iran are working to update procedures, which will permit IAEA inspectors to review surveillance information on a daily basis to shorten detection time for any Iranian non-compliance. In addition, these facilities will continue to be subjected to a variety of other physical inspections, including scheduled and unannounced inspections.

The Arak reactor and associated facilities will be subject to at least monthly IAEA inspections – an increase from the current inspection schedule permitting IAEA access approximately once every three months or longer.

Iran has also agreed to provide for the first time:

Long-sought design information on the Arak reactor;

Figures to verify that centrifuge production will be dedicated to the replacement of damaged machines; and

Information to enable managed access at centrifuge assembly workshops, centrifuge rotor production workshops and storage facilities, and uranium mines and mills.

These enhanced monitoring measures will enable the IAEA to provide monthly updates to the Joint Commission on the status of Iran’s implementation of its commitments and enable the international community to more quickly detect breakout or the diversion of materials to a secret program.

With respect to centrifuges, the U.S. has caved several times on the numbers and types that Iran can have and use and will very likely continue to do so. As of late September, The U.S.

is considering softening present demands that Iran gut its uranium enrichment program in favor of a new proposal that would allow Tehran to keep nearly half of the project intact while placing other constraints on its possible use as a path to nuclear weapons, diplomats told The Associated Press.

The U.S., which fears Tehran may enrich to weapons-grade level used to arm nuclear warheads, ideally wants no more than 1,500 centrifuges left operating. Iran insists it wants to use the technology only to make reactor fuel and for other peaceful purposes and insists it be allowed to run at least the present 9,400 machines.

The tentative new U.S. offer attempts to meet the Iranians close to half way on numbers, said two diplomats who demanded anonymity because their information is confidential. They said it envisages letting Iran keep up to 4,500 centrifuges but would reduce the stock of uranium gas fed into the machines to the point where it would take more than a year of enrichment to create enough material for a nuclear warhead. [Emphasis added.]

Now, it appears that Iran has sped up Uranium enrichment and may also have violated the interim agreement.

Iran has stepped up efforts to develop a process that could enrich uranium at a much quicker pace, thereby violating the interim nuclear agreement reached with world powers last year, according to the Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security, or ISIS.

“Iran may have violated [the interim deal] by starting to feed [natural uranium gas] into one of its advanced centrifuges, namely the IR-5 centrifuge,” ISIS wrote in an analysis of the confidential IAEA report issued Friday to member states, according to Reuters. “Under the interim deal, this centrifuge should not have been fed with [gas] as reported in this safeguards report.”

. . . .

Iran has also reportedly sped up its low-grade uranium enrichment over the past two months, growing its stockpile by 8% to 8.4 tons.

The issue of advanced enrichment is sensitive because Iran could potentially produce a nuclear weapon if it processes the material further, a main concern for the West.

Perhaps Obama’s willingness to cave is why, as noted above, “the Supreme Leader may be preparing to sign off on a deal.”

Moreover, as I noted here, here and here, the interim agreement and the White House Summary omit any mention of Iran’s military-nuclear sites, such as Parchin, where the IAEA had reason to think that there had been implosion testing in 2011 but was refused access to inspect. They also fail to mention

Development and construction of rocketry capable of delivering nuclear warheads; and

Development and testing of nuclear warheads.

If Iran’s continuing development of militarized nukes is of no consequence, what (besides a legacy for Obama) is the purpose of a deal? Might this happy language in the White House Summary be meaningless?

The Joint Plan of Action marks the first time in nearly a decade that the Islamic Republic of Iran has agreed to specific actions that stop the advance of its nuclear program, roll back key aspects of the program, and include unprecedented access for international inspectors. [Emphasis added.]

The farce continues apace. As the Daily Beast pointed out on November 7th,

Iran continues to refuse to disclose its nuclear activity, and experts do not anticipate the country will become more transparent in the future. That’s the assessment released Friday from the International Atomic Energy Agency. “The agency is not in a position to provide credible assurance about the absence of undeclared nuclear material and activities in Iran, and therefore to conclude that all nuclear material in Iran is in peaceful activities,” said the report, which was also pessimistic about the chance that Iran will be forthright with its nuclear activities in the future. [Emphasis added.]

Scott Johnson at Power Line posted an article on November 7th titled How to understand Obama’s Iran diplomacy. It’s a very good article, so please read the whole thing. He wrote, in the lead paragraph,

I think the easiest way to understand Obama’s diplomacy is this. Assume that Obama believes Iran should have nuclear weapons and would like to facilitate the mullahs’ nuclear weapons program. This assumption is the Occam’s Razor that clarifies what might otherwise be obscure. The assumption may not be correct, but it should prove a handy guide to coming attractions. [Emphasis added.]

Mr. Johnson may well be correct. Or perhaps Obama cares less about whether Iran gets (or keeps) nukes than He cares about securing a legacy. Either way, it’s bad for much of the Middle East and also for the United States.

Iran’s human rights record and support for terrorism

Nor was there any mention in the P5+1 interim deal, or the White House Summary, of Iran’s horrendous and worsening human rights record. According to an article titled Iran Amputating Limbs, Burning Political Opponents,

Iran executed a record-shattering 411 citizens in the first half of 2014 and a total of 852 people in the last 15 months, including at least eight juveniles, according to a new United Nations report that will be introduced to the organization’s General Assembly Tuesday.

In addition to a surge in state-sanctioned killings that a U.N. official referred to as “shocking,” Iran continues to torture imprisoned individuals using techniques such as amputation, electroshock, flogging, and burnings, according to the report, which details human rights in the Islamic Republic.

As noted at the Daily Beast.

While Secretary of State Kerry has referred on occasion to Iran’s human rights record as “abysmal,” the Obama administration has done precious little to pressure Iran on this front. In fact, the rare tough talk of American diplomats has become outpaced by growing references to their blossoming friendship with Iranian regime officials. “It’s reached a level of we know each other well enough to make jokes,” a senior U.S. official recently gushed to reporters. [Emphasis added.]

What do they joke about? Obama? Human rights? Terror? Nukes? Israel?

What does our desperation to get a nuclear deal at all costs say to the modern-day Iranian Solzhenitsyns rotting in Evin prison? Or to the young social-media savvy generation who took to the streets in 2009 after Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s fraudulent reelection? [Emphasis added.]

Rayhaneh Jabbari, executed

Rayhaneh Jabbari, executed by Iran

The interim deal as well as the White House Summary also suggest that P5+1 discussions will take no account of Iran’s already massive support for terrorism, for which it will have even more funds as sanctions continue to disappear.

Conclusions

For a major supporter of international terrorism, with a worsening human rights record that makes even that of North Korea seem relatively tame, to have and to be in a position to use nukes will be worse than merely shameful.

What will be Iran’s first nuclear target? Over the weekend the Supreme Leader repeated, for the nth time, his views on Israel:

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called for the destruction of Israel over the weekend, stating that the “barbaric” Jewish state “has no cure but to be annihilated.

Will this, transformed from a simulation into reality, be part of Obama’s legacy?

Who will be next? The Great Satan, perhaps?

A good deal for Iran is also bad for the decreasingly free “free world” for a different reason: since the Obama Nation won’t stand up, effectively, for democracy with freedom — including even the most basic of human rights — who will? Formerly Great Britain?

Continuing and largely successful efforts to sanitize Islam through multicultural political correctness and its necessary ally, repression of what was once free speech, may well mean that no nation will do more than make bland and ineffective shows of standing for even the most basic of human rights.

Categories: Iran, Iranian nukes, Islamism, Israel, Kobani, Multiculturalism, Netanyahu, Nukes, Obama, P5+1
Tags: IAEA, Iran, Nukes, Supreme leader

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Top aide to Iran Supreme Leader may join Oman talks with John Kerry

November 9, 2014

Top aide to Iran Supreme Leader may join Oman talks with John Kerry, Al-Monitor, Laura Rozen, November 8, 2014

Ali Akbar Velayati, foreign policy adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Khamenei, may join nuclear talks between the United States and Iran in Oman this week, in a sign a deal may be moving closer.

**************

A top adviser to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei may join talks in Oman between the United States and Iran in the coming days, in a sign that a breakthrough may be imminent in reaching a nuclear deal, Al-Monitor has learned.

Ali Akbar Velayati, longtime foreign policy adviser to Khamenei and a former Iranian foreign minister, may join the talks between US Secretary of State John Kerry, Iran’s Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif and European Union negotiator Catherine Ashton, in a signal that the Supreme Leader may be preparing to sign off on a deal, sources told Al-Monitor on condition of anonymity.

US and Iranian officials did not immediately respond to queries from Al-Monitor about the prospect that Velayati might join the Oman talks.

Velayati, speaking at a meeting with Norway’s foreign minister in Tehran last week, praised the role of Oman in hosting the upcoming trilateral talks, and said Iran seeks to reach a final nuclear deal quickly.

“We want for the talks to resolve as soon as possible, and arrive at an agreement like the one we did in Geneva last year,” Velayati said Nov. 2., Iran’s Mehr news agency reported. “But the agreement must meet Iran’s interests.”

Velayati also praised Oman as having always demonstrated “good intentions toward its relations with Iran.”

The meeting between Kerry, Zarif and Ashton is due to get underway Nov. 9 in Muscat, Oman, which hosted secret US-Iran talks that helped lead to reaching the interim Iran nuclear deal last year. Following the two-day US/Iran/EU trilateral meeting Nov. 9-10, negotiators from the rest of the P5+1 — the five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany — are supposed to join the talks in Oman for a Nov. 11 meeting. Another, possibly final, round of P5+1 Iran talks is due to be held in Vienna from Nov. 18 to 24.

US, Iranian and Russian negotiators say there is still more work to be done, but are expressing increasing, albeit cautious, optimism that a deal is within reach.

“We are hopeful that over the course of the next weeks, it will be possible to close real gaps that still exist in order to be able to reach an agreement,” Kerry said following a meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in China on Nov. 7. “But I’m not going to stand here and predict at this point in time what the odds of that are.”

The next few days of meetings in Oman will be critical to see if the sides will be able to overcome remaining, if narrowed, gaps on the issues of enrichment capacity and sanctions relief to finalize the deal, US and Iranian officials said.

“No one wants to return to the way things were before the Geneva Agreement. That would be too risky a scenario,” Iran Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi told Iran’s IRNA news agency Nov. 8, before he and the Iran nuclear negotiating team traveled to Oman, Reuters reported.

“Both sides are aware of this, which is why I think a deal is within reach,” Araghchi said. “We are serious and I can see the same resolve on the other side.”

Russia’s top negotiator, speaking to Russian media following a coordination meeting of P5+1 political directors in Vienna Nov. 7, also voiced determination to finish the deal.

“All participants voiced additional proposals” at the Nov. 7 Vienna meeting, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov told Russia’s Ria Novosti news agency. “We are determined to put it all together in such a way that key compromises could be reached before the [Nov. 24] deadline.”

Iranian journalists, responding to Al-Monitor’s report, suggested Velayati might be coming to Oman to bring a message from Khamenei to Kerry. President Obama reportedly wrote Khamenei a letter in October, the Wall Street Journal reported Nov. 3. The letter was described as saying that the nuclear deal being offered adhered to Khamenei’s expressed desire to prove to the world Iran is not seeking a nuclear weapon, while allowing Iran to have a robust civil nuclear energy program, and that such a deal could benefit the United States’ and Iran’s common regional interest in fighting the Islamic State, reports said.

Kerry, when asked about the US message to Iran Nov. 8, stressed that there is no linkage between the Iran nuclear talks and regional issues.

“There is no linkage whatsoever of the nuclear discussions with any other issue, and I want to make that absolutely clear,” Kerry told reporters in China, Reuters reported. “The nuclear negotiations are on their own.”

Categories: Iran, Iranian nukes, Kerry, Obama, P5+1
Tags: Iran, Nukes

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How to understand Obama’s Iran diplomacy

November 8, 2014

How to understand Obama’s Iran diplomacy, Power Line, Scott Johnson, November 7, 2014

I think the easiest way to understand Obama’s diplomacy is this. Assume that Obama believes Iran should have nuclear weapons and would like to facilitate the mullahs’ nuclear weapons program. This assumption is the Occam’s Razor that clarifies what might otherwise be obscure. The assumption may not be correct, but it should prove a handy guide to coming attractions.

Obama bids against himself chasing after the mullahs. You can say that he doesn’t know how to negotiate, and it’s a plausible hypothesis. As Michael Rubin explains, “Desperation is not a good negotiating position” (unless you want to give it away).

But how explain Obama’s vehement opposition in the past to the imposition of sanctions against Iran by Congress, or the threat of such sanctions in the future in the case no final deal were to be reached?

How explain his concession up front (in the P5+1 interim agreement with Iran) to Iran’s nuclear enrichment?

How explain the offer to agree to an ever increasing number of centrifuges for enrichment?

How explain the apparent acceptance of a prospective deal without proof that Iran’s nuclear program is peaceful in nature, which is in itself an absurd and unbelievable proposition?

And so on, and so on.

When Obama makes the famously false promise that he is from the government and he is here to help, he means it in the case of the mullahs.

Today’s page-one story in the Wall Street Journal reveals Obama’s fourth secret letter to the mullahs in search of a deal. He is pleading with them. He will not take no for an answer. See Michael Rubin, “White House ignores Khameni response to letters.”

Obama’s most recent letter is already yesterday’s news. Today’s news comes via the IAEA. Omri Ceren summarizes it as follows in an email message this morning:

The new IAEA report went online about two hours ago. No changes from last time: not only are the Iranians continuing to block the Agency’s work, but they’re refusing to offer new ways of moving forward. Zero progress during the reporting period, and no sign that the next one will be any better.

The report is here The key lines are:

“The Agency is not in a position to provide credible assurances about the absence of undeclared nuclear material and activities in Iran, and therefore to conclude that all nuclear material in Iran is in peaceful activities”

“Iran has not provided any explanations that enable the Agency to clarify the outstanding practical measures, nor has it proposed any new practical measures in the next step of the Framework for cooperation”

The Iranians seem to be betting that the West will eventually drop the demand that Tehran come clean about the possible military dimensions (PMDs) of its nuclear program. Negotiations will come down to the wire, all of the other issues will have been massaged, and Iranian negotiators will look up and say the equivalent of ‘you’re not really going to blow up this whole deal over something we did in the past, are you?’ Under that scenario the message will be echoed by a few advocates in the nonproliferation world, the P5+1 will latch on to the reasoning, and that’ll be that.

The problem is that the PMD issue has very little to do with the past and everything to do with future verification. Unless the Iranians disclose what they’ve been doing on the nuclear front – including whatever the military is doing to surreptitiously enrich and store uranium – there’s no way to verify that they’ve stopped doing those things.

Remember how we got here. The P5+1 was supposed to be working with Iran on uranium, plutonium, and ballitsic missiles. Underneath all of those issues, the IAEA was supposed to be working on getting Iran to come clean on the full scope of its program: both the civilian and the military aspects (i.e. the PMDs).

People often talk and write about the PMD issue as if it’s just about weapons work – suspected Iranian experiments with detonators, warheads, etc. Those things matter but the issue is much broader. The IAEA wants access to all the places where the Iranian military had its hand in any atomic work – uranium mining, centrifuge construction, enrichment, and so on. The goal is to get a full picture of everything the Iranians are doing, so that the IAEA can confirm that they’ve stopped.

When the Iranians jam the IAEA up on PMDs, it’s not just another fourth core issue that can be negotiated alongside uranium, plutonium, and ballistic missiles. Transparency is the prerequisite to creating any robust verification scheme on those other three issues. It’s not possible for Western negotiators to say something like: ‘ok, we’ll give you a little on PMDs, but you have to give us something back on centrifuges.’ Without disclosure, there’s no way to verify that the Iranians are actually living up to their half of the trade.

Isn’t this obviously true? That’s where my Occam’s Razor cuts through the fog to help us understand what is happening now and what will in all likelihood be happening soon.

In related news, see Adam Kredo, “Report: Iran nuclear program more advanced than previously believed” and “Pentagon: Iran giving ‘lethal aid to the Taliban’ to fight US.”

UPDATE: Omri Ceren writes to update his message with news of today’s State Department briefing:

The issue came up in today’s State Department press briefing between the AP’s Matt Lee and State spox Jen Psaki. It actually came up twice, with [AP State Department reporter] Matt [Lee] circling back to it….The [short] version is that Jen left open the possibility that the US will take a deal with Iran even if the Iranians continue to obstruct the IAEA, i.e. even if they refuse to come clean on their past nuclear activity including military atomic work. If that happens it would mark another erosion in the US position, alongside reported walkbacks in the other three core areas: uranium, plutonium, and ballistic missiles. More problematically, letting Iran slide on IAEA inspections now risks gutting any verification regime set up later.

It is “problematic,” however, only if your (our) goal is to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons.

Categories: IAEI, Iran, Iranian nukes, Islamic State, Nukes, Obama, P5+1
Tags: IAEI, Iran, Nukes

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Iran and Israel, compare and contrast

November 8, 2014

Iran and Israel, compare and contrast, Power Line, John Hinderaker, November 7, 2014

As Scott noted earlier today, the Obama administration’s warm attitude toward Iran’s mullahs has been in the news. Its view of Israel, on the other hand, is much chillier.

Last night, General Martin Dempsey, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, gave a talk in which he lauded Israel’s avoidance of civilian casualties during the recent Gaza conflict, and stated that the U.S. military has sent a team of experts to Israel to study best practices in that regard. Via Yid With Lid:

I actually do think that Israel went to extraordinary lengths to limit collateral damage and civilian casualties. In fact, about 3 months ago we sent, we asked [IDF Chief of Staff] Benny [Gantz] if we could send a lessons learned team – one of the things we do better than anybody I think is learn – and we sent a team of senior officers and non-commissioned officers over to work with the IDF to get the lessons from that particular operation in Gaza. To include the measures they took to prevent civilian casualties and what they did with tunneling….

But they did some extraordinary things to try to limit civilian casualties to include calling out, making it known that they were going to destroy a particular structure. Even developed some techniques, they call it roof knocking, to have something knock on the roof, they would display leaflets to warn citizens and population to move away from where these tunnels. But look, in this kind of conflict, where you are held to a standard that your enemy is not held to, you’re going to be criticized for civilian casualties. So I think if Benny were sitting here right now he would say to you we did everything we could and now we’ve learned from that mission and we think there are some other things we could do in the future and we will do those. The IDF is not interested in creating civilian casualties, they’re interested in stopping the shooting of rockets and missiles, out of the Gaza Strip and in to Israel, and its an incredibly difficult environment, and I can say to you with confidence that I think that they acted responsibly.

So today a reporter asked State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki whether the Department agrees with General Dempsey’s assessment. Psaki parroted the Obama administration line: Israel should have done more. Here she is:

What that “more” might be is, of course, unspecified; nor is there any suggestion that Hamas and Fatah should have done more to stop the firing of rockets at Israeli civilians. But of course, civilian casualties are a greater or lesser issue, depending on which administration is under discussion. Just yesterday, a reporter asked Ms. Psaki about reports that civilians had been killed in a U.S. drone strike. Her answer, in essence: Hey, we’re doing the best we can:

QUESTION: Do you have any confirmation of reports that any civilians were killed in these – this latest round of strikes?

MS. PSAKI: Well, as you know, this is – any reports of civilian casualties we take very seriously. The Department of Defense looks into that. We understand that there have been reports from activists alleging that civilian casualties occurred. I’ll just reiterate that no other military in the world works as hard as we do to be precise and avoid civilian casualties. But while we strive to avoid them, when any allegation is presented we investigate it fully and strive to learn from it as to avoid it in the future. So that would, of course, be under the Department of Defense.

QUESTION: Yes.

MS. PSAKI: Asia?

QUESTION: Yes.

QUESTION: Wait. No other military in the world –

QUESTION [SIC]: Other than Israel.

QUESTION: Yeah, exactly. I seem to recall the Israelis saying this – the same thing. You think you’re better at it than the Israelis are?

MS. PSAKI: We think we hold ourselves to a high standard, and we continue – encourage all countries to do the same.

Michael Ramirez gets the last word. Click to enlarge:

Categories: Gaza, Hamas, Iran, Iranian nukes, Israel
Tags: civilian casualties, Gaza, Hamas, Israel, Obama Administration

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