Truth Catches the Iran Deal: Bret Stephens, Wall Street Journal, July 11, 2016— What diplomats call the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action—known to the rest of us as the Disastrous Iran Deal—was agreed in Vienna a year ago this week.
What's the Deal with Iran?: Michael Makovsky, Weekly Standard, July 18, 2016— July 14 marks a year since President Barack Obama announced an unsigned agreement with Iran on its nuclear program, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), perhaps the most important diplomatic event in recent memory.
Obama’s Iran Experiment: Clifford D. May, Washington Times, July 12, 2016 — A hypothetical question: Suppose the Islamic State wanted to buy some American airplanes and promised not to use them to support terrorists. Would you be OK with that? I’m guessing not.
Westerners Who Don Hijabs in Iran are a Disgrace: Amir Taheri, New York Post, July 3, 2016— In Iran, do as the mullahs say, not as Iranians do.
German Intelligence: Iran Continues to Seek Nuclear Weapons: Ami Rojkes Dombe, Israel Defense, July 10, 2015
The Iran Deal at One Year: Reality vs. the Promises: New York Post, July 2, 2015
Canadian Professor Held by Iran Appears to be Pawn in Regime’s Diplomatic Extortion Demands: Joseph Brean, National Post, July 11, 2016
Iran's Support for Terrorism Under the JCPOA: Matthew Levitt, Washington Institute, July 8, 2016
Bret Stephens
Wall Street Journal, July 11, 2016
What diplomats call the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action—known to the rest of us as the Disastrous Iran Deal—was agreed in Vienna a year ago this week. Now comes a status update, courtesy of our friends at the Bundesamt für Verfassungsschutz, or BfV. In its fascinating 2015 annual report, published late last month, the German domestic intelligence service reports a “particularly strong increase” in the number of Salafists, describes the reach of Russian and Chinese espionage efforts in Germany, and notes a growing number of right-wing extremists.
Then there’s this: “The illegal proliferation-sensitive procurement activities [by Iran] in Germany registered by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution persisted in 2015 at what is, even by international standards, a quantitatively high level. This holds true in particular with regard to items which can be used in the field of nuclear technology.” The report also notes “a further increase in the already considerable procurement efforts in connection with Iran’s ambitious missile technology program which could among other things potentially serve to deliver nuclear weapons. Against this backdrop it is safe to expect that Iran will continue its intensive procurement activities in Germany using clandestine methods to achieve its objectives.”
The BfV report arrived days before Germany arrested a Pakistani national, identified as Syed Mustufa H., accused of spying for Iran. It also corroborates another German report, this one from the intelligence service of North Rhine-Westphalia, that Iran’s nuclear procurement efforts have increased dramatically in recent years, from 48 known attempts in 2010 to 141 in 2015. Seven other German states have reported similar Iranian procurement efforts. This violates Iran’s explicit commitment to go through an official “procurement channel” to purchase nuclear- and missile-related materials. All this was enough to prompt Angela Merkel to warn the Bundestag last week that Iran “continued to develop its rocket program in conflict with relevant provisions of the U.N. Security Council.” Don’t expect German sanctions, but at least the chancellor is living in the reality zone.
As for the Obama administration, not so much. For the past year it has developed a narrative—spoon-fed to the reporters and editorial writers Ben Rhodes publicly mocks as dopes and dupes—that Iran has met all its obligations under the deal, and now deserves extra cookies in the form of access to U.S. dollars, Boeing jets, U.S. purchases of Iranian heavy water (thereby subsidizing its nuclear program), and other concessions the administration last year promised Congress it would never grant. “We still have sanctions on Iran for its violations of human rights, for its support for terrorism, and for its ballistic-missile program, and we will continue to enforce those sanctions vigorously,” Mr. Obama said in January. Whatever.
The administration is now weighing whether to support Iran’s membership in the World Trade Organization. That would neutralize a future president’s ability to impose sanctions on Iran, since WTO rules would allow Tehran to sue Washington for interfering with trade. The administration has also pushed the Financial Action Task Force, an international body that enforces anti-money-laundering standards, to ease pressure on Iran, which FATF did last month by suspending some restrictions for the next year. And then there’s the Boeing deal to sell $17.6 billion worth of jets to Iran, which congressional Republicans led by Illinois’s Pete Roskam are trying to stop. Iran uses its civilian fleet to ferry weapons and fighters to its terrorist clients in Syria and Lebanon.
“The administration is trying to lock in the Iran deal and prevent a future president from doing anything, including pushing back on Iran’s malign behavior,” says the Foundation for Defense of Democracies’ Mark Dubowitz, who knows more about Iran sanctions than anyone in Washington. “Instead of curbing Iran’s worst behavior, the administration effectively facilitates it.” ne last detail: In June, the Journal’s Jay Solomon reported that the International Atomic Energy Agency had discovered “traces of man-made uranium” at Iran’s military facility at Parchin. The agency reported this finding in a footnote to a report in December, but the administration made no comment then and now dismisses it as old news. The IAEA is no longer allowed to inspect Parchin, or any other military installation, under the deal.
So let’s recap. Mr. Obama says Iran is honoring the nuclear deal, but German intelligence tells us Tehran is violating it more aggressively than ever. He promised “snapback” sanctions in the event of such violations, but the U.S. is operating as Iran’s trade-promotion agent. He promised “unprecedented” inspections, but we’re not permitted to inspect sites where uranium was found. He promised an eight-year ban on Iran’s testing of ballistic missiles, but Tehran violated that ban immediately and repeatedly with only mild pushback from the West. He promised that the nuclear deal was not about “normalizing” relations with a rogue regime. But he wants it in the WTO. Is Mr. Obama rationalizing a failed agreement or did he mean to mislead the American public? Either way, truth is catching up with the Iran deal.
Michael Makovsky
Weekly Standard, July 18, 2016
July 14 marks a year since President Barack Obama announced an unsigned agreement with Iran on its nuclear program, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), perhaps the most important diplomatic event in recent memory. A majority of Congress and Americans opposed it; Obama considers it his crowning foreign policy achievement. Given these starkly different views, and the high stakes for our national security, it is worth asking, after one year, what has the JCPOA accomplished?
President Obama claimed last year that, as a result of the JCPOA, “every pathway to a nuclear weapon is cut off" for Iran. The Islamic Republic has reduced its stockpile of low-enriched uranium by 97 percent, shipped out its spent fuel, cut by half its operating centrifuges, and junked the Arak plutonium reactor core. Together, these actions have extended from a couple months to perhaps one year the time it will take Iran to break out to nuclear weapons capability.
However, these are relatively temporary benefits. In seven years, Iran can begin R&D and production of advanced centrifuges that are 25 times faster than existing ones. And within 14 years, all meaningful restrictions on Iran's nuclear program fall away, freeing it to pursue a robust nuclear weapons capability, legally and legitimately. The JCPOA doesn't cut off Iran's pathway to nuclear weapons, but paves it. Despite Obama's promises that the JCPOA would bring full transparency, we know less about Iran's nuclear program than before. Iran has been allowed to self-inspect suspicious facilities, while reports on known facilities from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) remain woefully short on critical details, including how much uranium Iran is producing and stockpiling and how many centrifuges it is operating. Indeed, IAEA reports now provide less information than before by which to judge Iran's nuclear program.
An even more important result of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action is the effective legalization of Iran's ballistic missile program. Contrary to Secretary of State John Kerry's assurances to Congress last year, the prior ban on ballistic missile development has been replaced by the pusillanimous plea, in U.N. Security Council Resolution 2231, which incorporated the JCPOA, that "called upon" Iran to refrain from such activity—and in an annex on page 99, no less. The United States' most important objective regarding Iran should have been to ensure it could not launch nuclear weapons at the American homeland or our allies. Yet now Iran is legally testing ballistic missiles that, within a decade, could deliver such weapons here.
Another key dynamic of the JCPOA is Tehran's redoubled radicalism. President Obama argued that the JCPOA offered Iran the "opportunity" to follow "a different path, one of tolerance and peaceful resolution of conflict." Supporters of the deal argued it would aid moderates such as Iranian president Hassan Rouhani. Ben Rhodes, Obama's key foreign policy strategist, has since acknowledged that this was a manufactured narrative used to sell the deal.
Indeed, Rouhani and his colleagues continue to demonstrate just how hardline they all are. Rouhani last week bragged that the JCPOA "was the cheapest way to achieve Iran's goals and interests," including "liberating Palestine." Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei addressed Iran's ambition to establish "a unified anti-U.S. and anti-Zionist front." And Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati—who has declared, "We are an anti-American regime. America is our enemy, and we are the enemies of America"—was recently elected chairman of Iran's Assembly of Experts, which selects the next supreme leader.
This regime has been strengthened financially, though perhaps not as much as critics feared. Reports differ, but it appears Iran has thus far repatriated roughly $30 billion. This represents about 7 percent of the country's GDP and 20 times what Tehran gives its military/terrorist proxy, Hezbollah. This windfall has enabled Iran to increase its defense budget and its mischief-making abroad. The JCPOA has demolished American credibility perhaps even quicker than expected. By agreeing to the JCPOA, the United States abandoned its longstanding Israeli and Arab allies, sending a clear signal of timidity, fecklessness, and unreliability reverberating worldwide to friends and foes alike.
Tehran has been emboldened to assert and insert itself more aggressively abroad. It is more active and aggressive in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen than ever before, arming the Bashar al-Assad regime, Hezbollah, Hamas, Houthi rebels, and Iraqi Shiite militias. Iran has become more brazen in seeking to subvert American allies—stoking unrest in Bahrain and developing a presence on Syria's border with Israel. Qassem Suleimani, head of Iran's terrorist Quds Force, with the blood of hundreds of U.S. soldiers on his hands, has become a regional rock star, publicly traveling to Russia, Syria, Iraq, and elsewhere. Iran has also provoked the United States directly. It fired rockets that endangered a U.S. aircraft carrier. It test-fired ballistic missiles. And Iran even illegally detained ten U.S. sailors, forcing them to kneel at gunpoint, and then publicized the photos.
The Obama administration's response to all these provocations has been to do virtually nothing, except in the case of the abducted U.S. sailors, when Kerry fantastically championed their subsequent release as evidence of improved bilateral relations resulting from the JCPOA. Any remaining American credibility vanished. Other countries have noticed. Russian president Vladimir Putin threw his military might behind the Assad regime, reversing four decades of American success in keeping Russia out of the region. He also sold Iran advanced S-300 air defense systems, which had once been seen as a red line—until Obama last year said he was surprised they hadn't been sold already. Reflecting this new reality, Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu, perhaps the most pro-American leader in the world, has met with Putin in Moscow four times in the last year.
There has been one very positive if unintended consequence: The Sunni Arabs have felt compelled to collaborate more closely with Israel and with one another. They are now alone together and share a strong need to constrain Iran and its proxies, as well as ISIS and the Muslim Brotherhood. Saudi Arabia will now honor the Egypt-Israel peace treaty regarding Red Sea islands, prominent former Saudi officials have publicly appeared with Israelis, and the United Arab Emirates has permitted an Israeli diplomatic office in Abu Dhabi…
[To Read the Full Article Click the Following Link—Ed.]
Clifford D. May
Washington Times, July 12, 2016
A hypothetical question: Suppose the Islamic State wanted to buy some American airplanes and promised not to use them to support terrorists. Would you be OK with that? I’m guessing not. Now suppose that the Islamic Republic of Iran wanted to buy some American airplanes, and promised not to use them to support terrorists. This question is not hypothetical. This is something Tehran very much wants and President Obama is eager to provide. Are you OK with that?
Mr. Obama might argue that the Islamic State and the Islamic republic are very different. I’d say, yes and no. For example, the Islamic State is a terrorist entity. The Islamic republic, as the U.S. government acknowledges, is the world’s most active state sponsor of terrorism. The Islamic State slaughters Christians and Yazidis. The Islamic republic persecutes Baha’i but tolerates Christians — so long as they accept second-class status. Both the Islamic State and the Islamic republic execute members of what they don’t call the LGBT community.
Ali Khamenei, Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran, has the intention, if not yet the capability, to bring “death” to America and Israel. The same is true of Abu Bakr-al Baghdadi, the self-proclaimed caliph of the Islamic State. Supporters of the Islamic State have murdered dozens of Americans in America (while also slitting the throats of several in Syria). Iranian-backed Shia militias have murdered hundreds of Americans in Iraq and Lebanon (though an Iranian attempt to blow up a Washington D.C. restaurant in 2011 failed).
There are, to be sure, stylistic differences between the Islamic State and the Islamic republic. Jihadis for the former proudly take selfies while holding bleeding human heads by the hair. Jihadis for the latter probably find that gauche. Take Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif, often described in the media as a moderate. He speaks impeccable English and you can bet he knows which fork to use when dining with Secretary of State John Kerry at expensive Viennese restaurants. But two years ago, he laid a wreath on the Beirut grave of Imad Mugniyeh, the Hezbollah commander responsible for numerous terrorist atrocities, including the 1983 Beirut bombing that killed 241 U.S. Marines.
The current debate over whether to sell aircraft to Iran stems from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) — the deal Mr. Obama cut with Iran’s rulers one year ago, on July 14, 2015. He has repeatedly asserted that it prevents Tehran from acquiring nuclear weapons. In reality, restrictions on Iran’s nuclear weapons program will disappear after eight years — assuming that Iran’s rulers don’t cheat (which they already are, as I’ll outline in a moment). In exchange for Iran mothballing parts of its nuclear weapons program, many of the toughest American and international economic sanctions have been lifted. Iran’s rulers now have access to $100 billion in what had been blocked assets.
As expected, Iran’s economy is recovering. Nevertheless, Ayatollah Khamenei is dissatisfied. He recently charged that Americans were creating “Iranophobia so no one does business with Iran.” In response, Secretary of State John Kerry has been telling Europeans and anyone else who would listen about all the marvelous investment opportunities available in Iran. Soon after, Boeing announced a $25 billion deal to sell and lease aircraft to government-owned Iran Air. Iran’s rulers say the aircraft will be used only for civilian transportation. But it’s no secret that they’ve been running an illicit airlift of weapons and fighters to Syria where Hezbollah, their proxy militia, as well as elite units of their Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, are taking part in the Syrian civil war — a conflict that has claimed as many as 400,000 lives and displaced millions…
[To Read the Full Article Click the Following Link—Ed.]
WESTERNERS WHO DON HIJABS IN IRAN ARE A DISGRACE
Amir Taheri
New York Post, July 3, 2016
In Iran, do as the mullahs say, not as Iranians do. This seems to be the motto adopted by a string of foreign dignitaries rushing to Tehran in the wake of the mythical “nuke deal” marketed by the Obama administration. For more than a decade almost no one wanted to go to the capital of the Islamic Republic, designated by many as “the world No. 1 sponsor of international terrorism.” This year, however, heads of state and other senior officials from over 60 nations, including most Western powers, have taken the flying carpet to Tehran to pay tribute to Obama’s “new moderate Iran.”
President Obama’s seven-year campaign to restore diplomatic relations to Iran was never likely to alter the Khomeinist regime’s destructive behavior. But some European powers were keen to disregard the Islamic Republic’s visceral anti-Americanism and focus on obtaining juicy commercial deals. The mullahs seized the opportunity to claim “total victory over the Great Satan” as part of a new narrative according to which “the whole world” was rushing to Iran to pay tribute to the “Supreme Guide” as the living incarnation of Islam. It was no surprise that high-profile visitors like Russian President Vladimir Putin or his Chinese counterpart Xi Jingping failed to mention such issues as human rights, executions and terrorism in polite dinner-table conversation in Tehran.
The surprise came from Western leaders visiting the Islamic Republic and talking in strict accordance with scripts established by the ruling mullahs. German Vice-Chancellor Sigmar Gabriel went to Tehran twice, recalling their “common historic bonds” which presumably include the claimed “joint Aryan ancestry.” But he uttered not a word about such embarrassing issues as Iran topping the list of nations in the number of executions and political prisoners. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius was warm in paying tribute to the “great Iranian culture,” but was too polite to mention that for three decades the Islamic regime has been busy trying to destroy that very culture to the point of establishing a list of words that cannot be mentioned in Persian poetry.
Meanwhile, Austrian President Heinz Fischer, whose term has since ended, put flowers at Ayatollah Khomeini’s mausoleum and praised the despot who had presided over the execution of more than 120,000 Iranians as “a man of peace and spirituality.” Then we have Cardinal Vincenzo Paglia, head of the Vatican’s office on family affairs. He went to the “holy” city of Qom to persuade the ayatollahs there to enter an alliance with the Catholic Church in defense of “the sacred institution of marriage” and against “deviant ways.” The cardinal’s visit came just two days after the massacre at a gay bar in Orlando, Fla., and was seized upon by the Tehran media as a reminder by the church that a “same-sex relation” is a sin.
The Western women officials who visited the mullahs didn’t always behave in a dignified manner either. They discarded their ordinary attire in favor of dress codes and hijab styles approved by the Islamic Foreign Ministry, the same dress codes and hijabs that millions of Iranian women are fighting against each day. The European Union foreign policy tsarina Federica Mogherini, a frequent hobnobber with mullahs, came dressed in black, the color of Bani-Abbas. She went even further by inviting Islamic Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif to join the dialogue on “human rights in Europe” and suggest measures in favor of Islam which Mogherini says is an “integral part of Europe.”…
But the crown for vile flattery goes to Christine Defraigne, president of the Belgian Senate, who went around telling the mullahs and their minions that the West had “a lot to learn from Islam” to “improve the status of women.” She ignored the fact that, while she was flattering the mullahs, hundreds of Iranian women were arrested and insulted by Islamic vigilantes who claimed their hijab was “inadequate.” Defraigne tried to justify her own wearing of the hijab by claiming that the headgear was “part of Iranian culture,” a manifest lie as it was invented in the 1970s and imposed from 1980 onwards.
Two officials behaved with dignity. One was South Korean President Park Geun-hye who dressed normally and wore a white, thin, headpiece and said not a word in praise of the mullarchy. Another was Croatian President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic, who wore thin headgear covering half of her blond hair at official functions but not during unofficial sightseeing. The mullahs retaliated by posting photos of her in swimsuits on the Internet and even attacking her as “a slut with no qualms about wearing a bikini.” However, the main prize for dignified behavior must go to German Chancellor Angela Merkel. She simply refused to visit the Islamic Republic because she would not wear the hijab and dress up for what amounts to a farce endorsing tragedy.
German Intelligence: Iran Continues to Seek Nuclear Weapons: Ami Rojkes Dombe, Israel Defense, July 10, 2015—The 2015 Annual Report on the Protection of the Constitution issued by the German Ministry of the Interior states that "a further increase (was registered) in the already considerable procurement efforts in connection with Iran's ambitious missile technology program which could among other things potentially serve to deliver nuclear weapons."
The Iran Deal at One Year: Reality vs. the Promises: New York Post, July 2, 2015—To mark the first anniversary of President Obama’s deal with Iran, the folks at the Foreign Policy Initiative have just published a comprehensive compilation of promises vs. results. It’s a devastating roundup.
Canadian Professor Held by Iran Appears to be Pawn in Regime’s Diplomatic Extortion Demands: Joseph Brean, National Post, July 11, 2016—When she was held for interrogation in Tehran’s notorious Evin prison last month, the family of Iranian-Canadian anthropologist Homa Hoodfar hoped it was a misunderstanding, and that the Concordia University professor was wrongly targeted while researching feminist political activism during a tense election.
Iran's Support for Terrorism Under the JCPOA: Matthew Levitt, Washington Institute, July 8, 2016—When the JCPOA was implemented in January, terrorism-related sanctions remained in place against Iran, and U.S. officials promised they would hold Tehran accountable for any such activity despite the lifting of nuclear sanctions. As Secretary of State John Kerry noted on January 21, "If we catch them funding terrorism, they're going to have a problem with the United States Congress and with other people, obviously." And yet, in the year since the deal was signed, Iran's threatening behavior has not diminished.
