Thursday, November 28, 2013

11.26.2013 - 7:10 PM

Since Secretary of State John Kerry and President Obama announced the nuclear deal with Iran on Saturday, outrage over what Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu rightly termed a “historic mistake” has been intense, especially among supporters of Israel. That has led some observers to invoke comparisons with the 1938 Munich agreement in which the Western powers betrayed Czechoslovakia in an attempt to appease Adolf Hitler’s Germany. While invective along these lines has been flying around the Internet and Twitter, the question of whether Munich should be mentioned in the same breath as the agreement signed this past weekend in Geneva was discussed this morning by Pulitzer Prize winning columnist Bret Stephens in the Wall Street Journal. According to Stephens, the deal Obama is claiming as a triumph for diplomacy is “worse than Munich.”

Is he right? There are those who will claim it is impossible to compare any event with one that is associated with the Holocaust and still win an argument. But whether you think the deal is as bad as Stephens thinks or whether the price of a mistake with Iran is as costly as the West’s miscalculations about Hitler, the real answer depends on whether Iran betrays Obama.

As to the merits of the Iran deal, the facts are very much with Stephens in terms of the feckless nature of this diplomatic endeavor. The agreement loosened sanctions and handed over billions in frozen cash to the Islamist regime while tacitly legitimizing the Iranian nuclear program and its drive for a weapon even as it claims to do the opposite. While administration supporters can claim that the sanctions relief involves a fraction of the existing restrictions, neither can they claim that Iran’s supposed concessions do anything to roll back the nuclear progress Tehran has made in the last five years. Instead of making the world, and even Israel, safer, as Obama and Kerry have insisted, it makes it more likely that Iran will get a nuclear deal in the long run as well as heightening the chances of a Middle East arms race involving Saudi Arabia and new outbreaks of violence involving current and perhaps future Iranian allies like Syria, Hezbollah, and Hamas.

While there is no direct analogy between Britain and France’s decision to carve up the Czechoslovak homeland in order to appease Germany’s territorial demands, should Iran get a nuclear weapon the comparison with Munich may be apt. While one can make an argument that the Iranian regime isn’t crazy enough to actually use a nuke on Israel, given the genocidal threats they’ve made against the Jewish state, dismissing their desire to perpetrate a second Holocaust after some of their leaders have spent years denying the first one, should Iran go nuclear in the future, the deal will be thought of as being as every bit as much of a betrayal of Israel as Munich.

Stephens also makes an important point when he speaks of Obama’s desire for détente with Iran as being far less defensible than British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s decision to trust “Herr Hitler.” Britain and France were weak in 1938. It can, as Stephens points out, be argued that delaying the war with Germany by a year, during which Britain built up its military forces, hurt Hitler even if it did result in the annihilation of the Czechs. Though appeasers might have been justified in thinking they had no better option in 1938 than to give in to Hitler, there is no comparable excuse available for Obama and Kerry. Iran is weaker than the West and its economy is, thanks to the sanctions that Obama opposed and delayed implementing, in tatters. Yet, the U.S. negotiated with Iran as if it was the weaker party. Like Chamberlain and French President Edouard Daladier, Obama sued the ayatollahs for peace while saying that the only alternative to appeasement was war. Though no one wants a war with Iran, the alternative was to toughen the sanctions and to increase pressure on Iran and to, at least, demand that it begin dismantling the nuclear program. Like the appeasers of 1938 who thought Hitler couldn’t be persuaded to back down and therefore must be given what he asked for, Obama gave in to Iranian demands because they insisted on them.

Iran is not the hegemonic power that Nazi Germany was. Nor can it attack the West on equal or superior military terms as Germany did. But the assumption that Iran has no capability or desire to commit genocide is merely a matter of faith. Once they get a nuke, and it can be argued that the Iran deal is a bridge to a containment policy rather than one aimed at prevention, genocide or at least a war with incalculable consequences becomes a possibility.

But as bad as the Iran deal was, the real analogy to Munich is the way in which Obama and Kerry not only ignored the concerns of the nations endangered by an Iranian nuke—Israel and Saudi Arabia—but also excluded them from the negotiations. Like the Czechs who were told by Chamberlain that they had no choice but to accept the dismemberment of their country, Israel and the Saudis have been callously told they can either like the deal or lump it.

Yet the problem for many people with any Munich problem is not so much the differences between the two situations but with the entire idea of appropriating any event that is part of the World War Two timeline to describe another conflict. It is an iron rule of debate that the first person to invoke the Holocaust usually loses and in the eyes of some any talk about Munich is always going to be viewed as over the top no matter how strong the analogy might be.

That may be so, but the flipside of this argument is that the problem with the Iran deal is not what it means for the world today but what will follow from it. Opponents of the appeasers of 1938 like Winston Churchill were unable to convince grateful Britons who were overjoyed that war had been averted no matter what the cost to listen to their warnings. They could point to the probable consequences, but until Hitler marched into Prague and then invaded Poland despite promising Chamberlain that he wouldn’t, it was just talk. So, too, are the critics of appeasing Iran powerless to do much to stop Obama’s policy until the Iranians prove them right.

Until that happens, Obama’s defenders can accuse Stephens and others like him of hyperbole and hysteria. But once Iran cheats on the deal and uses its weak terms to get closer to its nuclear ambition, they will sound a lot more credible even to liberals who are trying their best to ignore this debate. At that point, as the world trembles before a nuclear-armed state sponsor of terror run by Islamist fanatics, Stephens’s suggestion that Obama and Kerry are the same as the appeasers of Hitler, “minus the umbrellas,” will seem tame.

The 10 top items which make Iran nuke agreement the worst blunder in our lifetime by Scott Johnson of Powerline

The 10 top items which make Iran nuke agreement the worst blunder in our lifetime
by Scott Johnson of Powerline
1. The agreement is framed as an interim agreement, but it is renewable by mutual consent. There will be no going back until Iran chooses to go back. Live with it.
2. The agreement does not freeze or cap Iran’s nuclear program. Iran is to continue enrichment activities up to the 5 percent level. Its enrichment facilities remain unimpaired. Implications and/or statements to the contrary by the administration are false. The media’s failure to get this right is malpractice.
3. The agreement implicitly accepts Iran’s right to enrich uranium. Binding UN resolutions to the contrary notwithstanding, they will continue to enrich uranium under the agreement. The agreement also envisions a final agreement that “[i]nvolve[s] a mutually defined enrichment programme…for a period to be agreed upon.” The Iranians are right to celebrate the agreement; the Obama administration has to spin it.
4. The agreement extends Iran’s time to breakout by a month or two (anywhere from one month to “multiple months,” as a senior administration official explained to me). Technical expert David Albright — who expresses qualified support for the agreement — calculates the extension to “at least 1.9 to 2.2 months, up from at least 1 month to 1.6 months.” That is all.
5. The Iranian regime never disclosed its uranium enrichment facilities or heavy water reactor. Each was revealed by outsiders. The agreement addresses Iran’s known nuclear facilities with at least one exception. It makes no mention of Parchin, the military facility where Iran is believed by the IAEA to have conducted weaponization research and sought to conceal the evidence. As David Albright and Robert Avagyan wrote earlier this year: “The Parchin site remains of interest to the IAEA due to evidence of pre-2004 activities related to the development of nuclear weapons. Iran is alleged by the IAEA, the United States, and at least three European governments to have had a well-structured nuclear weapons program aimed at building a warhead small enough to fit on the Shahab 3 ballistic missile.” The agreement does not even warrant that Iran has no other dual-use or enrichment or nuclear facilities. Why?
6. The agreement is premised on the understanding that Iran’s nuclear program may have peaceful purposes: “The goal for these negotiations is to reach a long-term comprehensive solution that would ensure Iran’s nuclear programme will be exclusively peaceful.” This is a farcical pretense. It is inconceivable, for example, that Iran’s Arak heavy-water reactor has any other purpose than the provision of an alternate path to a nuclear weapon. To the extent that this is in fact an interim agreement, Iran gives up next to nothing on Arak (“for 6 months [Iran] will not commission the reactor or transfer fuel or heavy water to the reactor site and will not test additional fuel for the reactor or install remaining components”). To make concessions that are not concessions at all and in return secure the relaxation of the sanctions regime — this is “Iran’s tactic in a nutshell.”
7. Iran’s stockpile of enriched uranium is sufficient after further enrichment for approximately six nuclear weapons. The agreement does nothing with respect to the existing stockpile of enriched uranium other than provide for uranium enriched to 20 percent to be downgraded to 5 percent, from which it can be enriched further.
8. The relaxation of sanctions under the agreement is advertised as limited and reversible. The administration emphasizes the reversibility of the sanctions relief. The administration has opposed sanctions crafted by Congress every step of the way. As observers outside the administration have noted, as a practical reversal is of sanctions relief is highly unlikely. The relaxation is far more likely the preface to the unraveling of the sanctions regime regardless of the formalities.
9. Hard questions about the limited concessions made by Iran under the agreement elicit the response that “Iran wouldn’t agree” to more — and this was at a time when the sanctions carried their maximum bite. It also makes me wonder where the United States drew the line. Apparently not at a recognition of Iran’s right to uranium enrichment, which was expressly incorporated until France objected. Now it is only implicit.
10. The limited nature of the agreement combined with the relaxation of sanctions facilitates Iran’s development of nuclear weapons. Indeed, statements to the contrary notwithstanding, the Obama administration accepts Iran’s development of nuclear weapons.

Monday, November 25, 2013

Democrats oippose Iran deal too

Dershowitz: Iran Deal 'Cataclysmic Error of Gigantic Proportions'

Sunday, 24 Nov 2013 05:30 PM

By Greg Richter

Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz said Sunday that the Obama administration was naive and had possibly made a "cataclysmic error of gigantic proportions" in its deal to ease sanctions on Iran in exchange for an opening up of the Islamic Republic's nuclear program.

"I think it could turn out to be a cataclysmic error of gigantic proportions," Dershowitz said of the deal, which he described as "naive."

"It could also turn out to be successful, to be the beginning of a negotiated resolution," Dershowitz told Newsmax on Sunday. "But I think the likelihood of it being the former is considerably greater."

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Dershowitz said he thought the administration of President Barack Obama did a poor job of negotiating the deal.

"I think it's thoughtful and intelligent Americans vs. naive Americans," he said.

The deal, announced late Saturday night in the United States, makes it more likely Iran will develop a nuclear bomb, likely creating the need for a future military strike by Israel or the United States, Dershowitz said.

It also increases the possibility of a nuclear arms race in the Middle East with Saudi Arabia obtaining nuclear weapons as well, he said.

The Harvard Law School professor thinks there is at best a 10 percent chance that the administration can change attitudes among Iran's Islamist leadership.

"But when you weigh that against the 30 or 40 percent chance that they're dead wrong – nuclear bomb wrong – then it's a very bad assessment of risk and benefits," he told Newsmax.

"This is first-year negotiating theory, and this administration gets a D-minus with grade inflation," Dershowitz said. "You don't let up on sanctions that are working."

Other countries, such as China, are taking the deal as a green light to do business with Iran, he said. All the nuclear experts, Iran experts and congressional experts he has spoken with oppose the deal, he said.

Israel has spoken out against the deal, and Saudi Arabia is known to be wary of Iran. But it is a mistake to think of it as a dispute between Israel and Saudi Arabia on one hand and the United States on the other, Dershowitz said. "This is a highly disputed and contested issue within the United States."

Dershowitz counts himself among the skeptics.

"I think it's a bad deal for America and a bad deal for the West," he said. "The risks to world peace are far greater than the potential benefits to world peace."

American negotiators used the wrong model, Dershowitz said. They used the model of Syria where the administration "accidentally backed into a good result instead of the North Korea model, which is much more parallel.

"North Korea does not pose a direct threat to the United States. Iran does," Dershowitz said. "You think that we'd learn from our mistakes in North Korea."

Dershowitz said that if Iran fails to comply, he hopes Congress ratchets up the sanctions once the six months are complete. But he isn't sure that will be possible since China and other nations will be doing business with them by then.

"I think we have hurt our sanction regime irretrievably by this measure," he said.

Congress should take preemptive action by passing authorization in advance to allow the president to increase sanctions and deploy the military option in the event Iran crosses a red line, Dershowitz said. That way, the president doesn't have to go to Congress after red lines are crossed.

"I think that would send a powerful message to Iran that the military option is still on the table," he said.

Former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton suggested the White House struck the deal out of fear that Israel would attack Iran's nuclear facilities as it did those of Iraq in 1981 and Syria in 2007.

Dershowitz said that since Israel was not consulted on the agreement, it isn't bound by it and is within its rights to defend itself.

Israel "has the absolute right to prevent a country that has threatened its destruction from developing nuclear weapons," he said. "That's a right in law, it's a right in morality, and it's a right in diplomacy."

Democratic Sen. Charles E. Schumer of New York said he was disappointed in the interim deal reached in Geneva regarding Iran’s nuclear program, saying "it does not seem proportional" because "Iran simply freezes its nuclear capabilities while we reduce the sanctions."
Schumer released the following statement on the deal regarding Iran's nuclear program:
"I am disappointed by the terms of the agreement between Iran and the P5+1 nations because it does not seem proportional. Iran simply freezes its nuclear capabilities while we reduce the sanctions.
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"It was strong sanctions, not the goodness of the hearts of the Iranian leaders, that brought Iran to the table, and any reduction relieves the psychological pressure of future sanctions and gives them hope that they will be able to gain nuclear weapon capability while further sanctions are reduced. A fairer agreement would have coupled a reduction in sanctions with a proportionate reduction in Iranian nuclear capability.
"The goal of the administration is to eliminate all of Iran’s nuclear weapons-making capability by the end of the final negations; it is still my hope they can achieve that goal.

"As for additional sanctions, this disproportionality of this agreement makes it more likely that Democrats and Republicans will join together and pass additional sanctions when we return in December. I intend to discuss that possibility with my colleagues

Tags: Nuclear Iran | democrats | republicans | iran | oppose

Both Democrats and Republicans Skeptical of Iran Deal

Sunday, 24 Nov 2013 05:04 PM

By By Audrey Hudson and Amy Woods

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Both sides of the political aisle expressed strong skepticism over the deal announced in Geneva early Sunday that dropped many sanctions against Iran in exchange for concessions in its nuclear program.

Democratic Sen. Charles Schumer and Rep. Eliot Engel both of New York joined numerous Republicans in criticizing the deal on Sunday.

Engel expressed doubt on Sunday the plan will succeed without continued sanctions.

"I don't think you make them bargain in good faith by going squishy," Engel, the ranking Democrat on the House Foreign Relations Committee told CNN's "State of the Union."

"I think we could have played good cop, bad cop, and Congress really believes sanctions should happen," Engel said. "That's what brought Iran to the table in the first place."

Schumer said in a statement that he was disappointed in the interim deal reached in Geneva regarding Iran’s nuclear program, saying "it does not seem proportional" because "Iran simply freezes its nuclear capabilities while we reduce the sanctions."

Sen. Bob Menendez, the chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, also criticized what he perceived as a more one-sided deal that benefits Iran.

But the New Jersey Democrat also said that he expected any further sanctions legislation would adjust for the six-month window in the interim agreement, allowing for negotiators to work on a permanent deal.

“I expect that the forthcoming sanctions legislation to be considered by the Senate will provide for a six month window to reach a final agreement before imposing new sanctions on Iran, but will at the same time be immediately available should the talks falter or Iran fail to implement or breach the interim agreement,” Menendez said in a statement.

On Thursday, Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said that he planned to move a sanctions measure when the Senate returns from a two-week Thanksgiving break on Dec. 9. Reid was noticeably quiet on Sunday in what some observers interpreted as resistance to the deal.

Many Republicans were even harsher in their opposition.

The six-month deal not only will enable Iran to continue to move ahead with its nuclear-development program, it also will leave the United States with less leverage because of the easing of economic sanctions, Republican Sen. Saxby Chambliss said on ABC's "This Week."

"Nothing in this deal requires the destruction of any centrifuges," said Chambliss, vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. "They're going to be able to replace centrifuges that become inoperable. I just don't see this movement in the direction of preventing Iran from developing a nuclear weapon at all."

The deal regarding the sanctions lets Iran "out of the trap," he said.

"Right now, the sanctions are working," Chambliss said. "The economy of Iran is heading south. Unemployment is skyrocketing. Instead of easing them, now is the time to tighten those sanctions, and let's get a long-term deal. We've got all the leverage in the negotiations, and we've let them out of the trap."

Republican Rep. Ed Royce of California, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said the deal meant Tehran would be able to keep key elements of its nuclear weapons-making capability while the U.S. would begin dismantling sanctions built up over years.

Saying that Iran is "spiking the football" over an interim deal to ease sanctions over its nuclear enrichment program, Republican Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee said he is crafting legislation to hold administration's and international community's feet the fire over next six months to ensure interim deal is not the norm.

The Obama administration is "long on announcements, but very short on follow-through," Corker said on "Fox News Sunday." But he said that while he'd like to a diplomatic solution, Congress must weigh in.

"America has not learned its lesson from 1994 when North Korea fooled the world. I am skeptical that this agreement will end differently," said California Republican Howard "Buck" McKeon, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee.

Sen. Mark Kirk, R-Ill, called Iran's concessions under the deal "cosmetic" partly because Tehran could continue to test long-range ballistic missiles.

"I will continue working with my colleagues to craft bipartisan legislation that will impose tough new economic sanctions if Iran undermines this interim accord or if the dismantlement of Iran's nuclear infrastructure is not underway by the end of this six-month period," Kirk said.

Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said that by "allowing the Iranian regime to retain a sizable nuclear infrastructure, this agreement makes a nuclear Iran more likely. There is now an even more urgent need for Congress to increase sanctions until Iran completely abandons its enrichment and reprocessing capabilities."

Read Latest Breaking News from Newsmax.com http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/democrats-republicans-iran-oppose/2013/11/24/id/538355#ixzz2lfl08WpB
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Obama's Iran desl-historic dsaster

Netanyahu: Geneva Agreement "a Historic Mistake"
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told the Israeli Cabinet on Sunday: "What was achieved last night in Geneva is not an historic agreement; it is an historic mistake. Today the world has become a much more dangerous place because the most dangerous regime in the world has taken a significant step toward attaining the most dangerous weapon in the world. For the first time, the world's leading powers have agreed to uranium enrichment in Iran while ignoring the UN Security Council decisions that they themselves led."
"Sanctions that required many years to put in place contain the best chance for a peaceful solution. These sanctions have been given up in exchange for cosmetic Iranian concessions that can be cancelled in weeks. This agreement and what it means endanger many countries including, of course, Israel. Israel is not bound by this agreement. The Iranian regime is committed to the destruction of Israel and Israel has the right and the obligation to defend itself, by itself, against any threat. As Prime Minister of Israel, I would like to make it clear: Israel will not allow Iran to develop a military nuclear capability." (Prime Minister's

Greatest Danger Is that Interim Agreement Will Become Permanent - Ron Ben-Yishai
If the interim agreement with Iran turns into a permanent agreement, as Israeli officials fear, it's a bad and even dangerous agreement. The Iranians are still unwilling to completely halt the construction of the heavy water reactor at Arak, which will allow the production of plutonium in about two-three years.
The Iranians are committed to stop enriching uranium to a 20% level and convert what they have into fuel rods or uranium oxide. Another commitment is not to increase the amount of 3.5% to 5% enriched uranium which they possess. These restrictions are in fact almost meaningless. With nearly 18,000 centrifuges used to enrich uranium, they can enrich uranium to any level they want within a short period of time. At the moment they already have more than eight tons of uranium enriched to 3.5-5%, enough for four to five atom bombs.
The Iranians are only committing, sometime in six months, to answer questions presented by the IAEA on the efforts it has made and is still making to develop the explosive device and warhead. During this time, they can complete the development of the nuclear weapon. (Ynet News)

The Hidden Cost of the Iranian Nuclear Deal - Michael Doran
I see the Iranian nuclear deal as a deceptively pleasant way station on the road that is the American retreat from the Middle East. By contrast, President Obama believes that six months from now, this process will culminate in a final, sustainable agreement.
On the nuclear question specifically, I don't see this as stage one. In my view, there will never be a final agreement. What the administration just initiated was, rather, a long and expensive process by which the West pays Iran to refrain from going nuclear. We are, in essence, paying Ayatollah Khamenei to negotiate with us. We just bought six months.
What was the price? We shredded the six UN Security Council resolutions that ordered the Islamic Republic to abandon all enrichment and reprocessing activities. And we started building a global economic lobby dedicated to eroding the sanctions that we generated through a decade of very hard diplomatic work. But the price that troubles me most is the free hand that the U.S. is now giving to Iran throughout the region. And Iran will now have more money to channel to proxies such as Hizbullah.
Six months from now, when the interim agreement expires, another payment to Ayatollah Khamenei will come due. If Obama doesn't pony up, he will have to admit then that he cut a bad deal now. The writer, a senior fellow in the Saban Center for Middle East Policy at Brookings, served as a U.S. deputy assistant secretary of defense and a senior director at the National Security Council. (Brookings Institution)

Saudi Prince: "The Threat Is from Persia, Not from Israel" - Jeffrey Goldberg
Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal told me, "There's no confidence in the Obama administration doing the right thing with Iran." Alwaleed believes that Iran will pocket whatever sanctions relief it gets without committing to ending its nuclear program.
I asked him if he thought the Arab states would actually back an Israeli strike on Iran's nuclear facilities. "Publicly, they would be against it," he said. "Privately, they would love it." "The Sunnis will love it....The Sunni Muslim is very much anti-Shiite, and very much anti-, anti-, anti-Iran."
You're sure they loathe Iran more than they loathe Israel, I asked? "Look, Iran is a huge threat, historically speaking....The Persian empire was always against the Muslim Arab empire, especially against the Sunnis. The threat is from Persia, not from Israel." (Bloomberg)

A Bad Agreement Likely to Get Worse - Mark Dubowitz and Orde Kittrie
The interim agreement includes several Iranian commitments that, if verifiably implemented, would extend Iran's nuclear breakout time from about a month to about two months.
It places more constraints on Iran's nuclear program than the deal that the Obama administration reportedly was prepared to sign two weeks ago. The Senate's threat to pass additional sanctions, France's objections to the initial deal, and Israel's fierce resistance to the terms of the proposed agreement seem to have played a role in providing U.S. negotiators with leverage to extract a better deal from Iran. Mr. Dubowitz is executive director of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies. Mr. Kittrie is a law professor at Arizona State University and a senior fellow at the foundation. (Wall Street Journal)

Observations:

Why the Iranian Nuclear Deal Is Dangerous - Eli Lake (Daily Beast)

The agreement signed in Geneva says Iran and six world powers will negotiate a comprehensive solution over the next six months that "would involve a mutually defined enrichment program with practical limits and transparency measures to ensure the peaceful nature of the program."

The offer represents a significant softening of earlier demands from the United States and even the Obama administration. During his first term, Obama offered Iran a deal that would have required Iran to import enriched nuclear fuel, but not allow Iran to make that fuel in facilities its government controlled.

See also Israeli Experts Suggest a Glass Half Full - Mitch Ginsburg (Times of Israel)

Dr. Ephraim Asculai, a veteran of both the IAEA and the Israel Atomic Energy Commission, noted Sunday that the Iran accord "does not do anything to change that [breakout] time, except perhaps in a very minor way." He said the agreed-upon limitations of the interim agreement add only "a few days" onto the regime's clock, should it decide to sprint toward a bomb.

The former head of IDF military intelligence and current director of the Institute for National Security Studies, Amos Yadlin, told Army Radio that the value of the agreement, which he termed "neither the dream agreement nor the destruction of the Third Temple," would only be evident in six months' time. "The fall of this regime before it gets the bomb should be our objective," he said.

Gen. Hayden: Iran Deal 'Worst of All Possible Outcomes'

Sunday, 24 Nov 2013 11:21 AM

By Audrey Hudson

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Former CIA Director Gen. Michael Hayden on Sunday criticized the Obama administration's deal with Iran saying it will only delay, not derail the country's nuclear program.

Hayden told CNN's "State of the Union" that Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry "hit the pause button, rather than delete button."

"Practically the worst of all possible outcomes, because now what you have here is a nuclear capable state," Hayden said.

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"I think frankly that is Iran's bottom line, so what we're negotiating on is how much time we're putting between their nuclear capability and a nuclear weapon, a nuclear reality," Hayden said.

"And my fear is, this interim agreement, which doesn't roll back much of anything at all, becomes a permanent agreement," Hayden said.

The six-month agreement between the U.S. and other nations requires Iran to limit its nuclear activities in exchange for some relief on sanctions.

Hayden said the agreement contradicts the U.S. alignment with Sunnis Muslim and Israelis in the region, and that it will take "an awful lot of hand holding" to convince our allies this is the correct course of action.

Former Secretary of State John Negroponte also appeared on CNN and said that the U.S. should not consider lifting sanctions until after all of the demands to roll back the nuclear program have been met.

"I think what worries a number of people is that we might get salami-sliced and that the Iranians will engage in dilatory tactics and then seek some more momentary relief from sanctions," Negroponte said.

Friday, November 22, 2013

It's insane to think peace can be made with Palestinians

Thursday, November 21, 2013

Iran doesn't care if their own die as long as lots of Jews die

People who argue its ok for Iran to get nuks because they'd never use them because a. Israel might retaliate and kill millions of Iranians and/or b. the Palestinians would suffer from the bombs too.
You are applying irrelevant Western ideas. With regard to a. Commentary Magazine this month " Some Israeli experts predict that the Iranian leadership would be willing to sacrifice 50 percent of their countrymen in order to eradicate Israel." b. If they don't care about half their population, you think they care about Palestinians?

Hebrews? Israelites? Jews? What are we? Where did these names come from?...

Wednesday, November 20, 2013

Obama's policies lead Egypt to go Soviet

Obama's policies lead Egypt to go Soviet

Is there anything Obama can get right? Have you ever seen a more incompetent and pro terrorist western leader?
He gives advanced weapons to Morsi Muslim brotherhood terrorists running Egypt then CUTS OFF aid and weapons when the pro west government takes over, so guess what? just announced
MOSCOW – The head of Russia's state-controlled industrial holding company says Moscow has signed a deal to provide Egypt with air defense missile systems.

Monday's statement by Russian Technologies chief Sergei Chemezov followed last week's trip to Egypt by Russia's foreign and defense ministries.

Chemezov, whose comments were carried by state RIA Novosti news agency, wouldn't elaborate on the missile deal.

He said that Egypt also expressed interest in other Russian weapons, including combat planes and helicopters, but has funding problems. He said Egypt could ask Russian for a loan to finance the weapons deals.

Monday, November 18, 2013

Apartheid Israel? No. Apartheid throughout the Muslim nations Jewu

Saturday, November 16, 2013

Obama betrays Israel

The demise of Pax Americana

By Caroline B. Glick

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The US remains the most powerful actor in the world. But last week, American credibility was shattered

JewishWorldReview.com | What happened in Geneva last week was the most significant international event since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. The collapse of the Soviet Union signaled the rise of the United States as the sole global superpower. The developments in the six-party nuclear talks with Iran in Geneva last week signaled the end of American world leadership.

Global leadership is based on two things — power and credibility. The United States remains the most powerful actor in the world. But last week, American credibility was shattered.

Secretary of State John Kerry spent the first part of last week lying to Israeli and Gulf Arab leaders and threatening the Israeli people. He lied to Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and the Saudis about the content of the deal US and European negotiators had achieved with the Iranians. Kerry told them that in exchange for Iran temporarily freezing its nuclear weapons development program, the US and its allies would free up no more than $5 billion dollars in Iranian funds seized and frozen in foreign banks.

Kerry threatened the Israeli people with terrorism and murder — and so invited both — if Israel fails to accept his demands for territorial surrender to PLO terrorists that reject Israel's right to exist. Kerry's threats were laced with bigoted innuendo. He claimed that Israelis are too wealthy to understand their own interests. If you don't wise up and do what I say, he intoned, the Europeans will take away your money while the Palestinians kill you. Oh, and aside from that, your presence in the historic heartland of Jewish civilization from Jerusalem to Alon Moreh is illegitimate.

It is hard to separate the rise in terrorist activity since Kerry's remarks last week with his remarks. What greater carte blanche for murder could the Palestinians have received than the legitimization of their crimes by the chief diplomat of Israel's closest ally?

Certainly, Kerry's negotiating partner Catherine Ashton couldn't have received a clearer signal to ratchet up her economic boycott of Jewish Israeli businesses than Kerry's blackmail message given just two days before the 75th anniversary of Kristallnacht.

Kerry's threats were so obscene and unprecedented that Israeli officials broke with tradition and disagreed with him openly directly, while he was still in the country. Normally supportive leftist commentators have begun reporting Kerry's history of anti-Israel advocacy, including his 2009 letter of support for pro-Hamas activists organizing flotillas to Gaza in breach of international and American law.

As for Kerry's lies to the US's chief Middle Eastern allies, it was the British and the French who informed the Israelis and the Saudis that far from limiting sanctions relief to a few billion dollars in frozen funds, the draft agreement involved ending sanctions on Iran's oil and gas sector, and other industries.

In other words, the draft agreement exposed Washington's willingness to effectively end economic sanctions against Iran in exchange for Iran's agreement to cosmetic concessions that will not slow down its nuclear weapons program.

Both the US's position, and the fact that Kerry lied about that position to the US's chief allies ended what was left of American credibility in the Middle East. That credibility was already tattered by US fecklessness in Syria and support for the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt.

True, in the end, Kerry was unable to close the deal he rushed off to Geneva to sign last Friday. Of course, it wasn't Iran that rejected the American surrender. And it wasn't America that scuttled the proposal. It was France. Unable to hide behind American power and recognizing its national interest in preventing Iran from emerging as a nuclear armed power in the Middle East, France vetoed deal that paved the way a nuclear Iran.

Kerry's failure to reach the hoped-for deal represented a huge blow to America, and a double victory for Iran. The simple fact that Washington was willing to sign the deal — and lie about it to its closest allies — caused the US to lose its credibility in the Middle East. Even without the deal, the US paid the price of appeasing Iran and surrendering leadership of the free world to France and Israel.

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For its part, just by getting the Americans to commit themselves to reducing sanctions while Iran continues its march to a nuclear weapon, Iran destroyed any remaining possibility of doing any serious non-military damage to Iran's plans for nuclear weaponry. At the same time, the Americans boosted Iranian credibility, endorsed Iranian power, and belittled Israel and Saudi Arabia — Iran's chief challengers in the Middle East. Thus, Iran ended Pax Americana in the Middle East, removing the greatest obstacle in its path to regional hegemony. And it did so without having to make even the slightest concession to the Great Satan.

As Walter Russell Mead wrote last week, it was fear of losing Pax Americana that made all previous US administrations balk at the possibility of reaching an accord with Iran. As he put it, "Past administrations have generally concluded that the price Iran wants for a different relationship with the United States is unsustainably high. Essentially, to get a deal with Iran we would have to sell out all of our other allies. That's not only a moral problem. Throwing over old allies like that would reduce the confidence that America's allies all over the world have in our support."

Yet, the Obama administration just paid that unsustainably high price, and didn't even get a different relationship with Iran.

Most analyses of what happened in Geneva last week have centered on what the failure of the talks means for the future of Obama's foreign policy. Certainly Obama, now universally reviled by America's allies in the Middle East, will be diplomatically weakened. This diplomatic weakness may not make much difference to Obama's foreign policy, because appeasement and retreat do not require diplomatic strength.

But the real story of what happened last week is far more significant than the future of Obama's foreign policy. Last week it was America that lost credibility, not Obama. It was America that squandered the essential component of global leadership. And that is the watershed event of this young century.

States act in concert because of perceived shared interests. If Israel and Saudi Arabia combine to attack Iran's nuclear installations it will be due to their shared interest in preventing Iran from acquiring a nuclear arsenal. But that concerted action will not make them allies.

Alliances are based on the perceived longevity of the shared interests, and that perception is based on the credibility of international actors. Until Obama became US President, the consensus view of the US foreign policy establishment and of both major parties was that the US had a permanent interest in being the hegemonic power in the Middle East. US hegemony ensured three permanent US national security interests: preventing enemy regimes and terror groups from acquiring the means to cause catastrophic harm; ensuring the smooth flow of petroleum products through the Persian Gulf and the Suez Canal; and demonstrating the credibility of American power by ensuring the security of US allies like Israel and Saudi Arabia. The third interest was an essential foundation of US deterrence of the Soviets during the Cold War, and of the Chinese over the past decade.

Regardless of who was in the White House, for the better part of the past seventy years, every US government has upheld these interests. This consistency built US credibility, which in turn enabled the US to throw its weight around.

Obama departed from this foreign policy consensus in an irrevocable manner last week. In so doing, he destroyed US credibility.

It doesn't matter who succeeds Obama. If a conservative internationalist in the mold of Harry Truman, John F. Kennedy or Ronald Reagan is elected in 2016, Obama's legacy will make it impossible for him to rebuild the US alliance structure. US allies will be willing to buy US military platforms — although not exclusively. They will be willing to act in a concerted manner with the US on a temporary basis to advance specific goals.

But they will not be willing to make any long term commitments based on US security guarantees. They will not be willing to place their strategic eggs in the US basket.

Obama has taught the world that the same US that elected Truman and formed NATO, and elected George H.W. Bush and threw Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait, can also elect a man who betrays US allies and US interests to advance a radical ideology predicated on a rejection of the morality of American power. Any US ally is now on notice that US promises — even if based on US interests — are not reliable. American commitments can expire the next time America elects a radical to the White House.

Americans uninterested in surrendering their role as global leader to the likes of Tehran's ayatollahs, Russia's KGB state and Mao's successors, must take immediate steps mitigate the damage Obama is causing. Congress could step in to clip his radical wings.

If enough Democrats can be convinced to break ranks with Obama and the Democratic Party's donors, Congress can pass veto-proof additional sanctions against Iran. These sanctions can only be credible with America's spurned allies if they do not contain any presidential waiver that would empower Obama to ignore the law.

They can also take action to limit Obama's ability to blackmail Israel, a step that is critical to the US's ability to rebuild its international credibility. For everyone from Anwar Sadat to South American democrats, for the past 45 years, America's alliance with Israel was a central anchor of American strategic credibility. The sight of America standing with the Jewish state, in the face of a sea of Arab hatred is what convinced doubters worldwide that America could be trusted.

America's appalling betrayal of Jerusalem under Obama likewise is the straw that has broken the back of American strategic credibility from Taipei to Santiago. If Congress is interested in rectifying or limiting the damage it could likewise remove the presidential waiver that enables Obama to continue to finance the PLO despite its involvement in terrorism and continued commitment to Israel's destruction. Congress could also remove the presidential waiver from the law requiring the State Department to move the US embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. Finally, Congress can update its anti-boycott laws to cover new anti-Israel boycotts and economic sanctions against the Jewish state and Jewish-owned Israeli companies.

These steps will not fully restore America's credibility. After all, the twice-elected President of the United States has dispatched his Secretary of State to threaten and deceive US allies while surrendering to US foes. It is now an indisputable fact that the US government may use its power to undermine its own interests and friends worldwide.

What these Congressional steps can do however, is send a message to US allies and adversaries alike that Obama's radical actions do not represent the wishes of the American people and will not go unanswered by their representatives in Congress.