The nuclear deal reached with Iran on Tuesday is clouded by uncertainty about whether the Iranian regime will live up to its relatively weak commitments. One outcome is almost certain, however: Israel will launch a pre-emptive strike against Iran, hoping to weaken the regime and stop, or slow, its nuclear program.
Late last month, several Middle East policy experts–including prominent former Obama administration officials–warned that negotiations with Iran were heading in the wrong direction. “The agreement will not prevent Iran from having a nuclear weapons capability,” they said, and warned that the terms would “fall short of meeting the administration’s own standard of a ‘good’ agreement.” They suggested that any Iran deal would have to cover five crucial elements–each of which, they suggested, were lacking in the emerging terms of the agreement.
Secretary of State John Kerry has called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s reaction to the Iran deal “way over the top,” even as others in the region have chimed in with their own criticisms of the deal, the Times of Israel reports.
In defending the nuclear deal reached with Iran in Vienna today, President Barack Obama said that the agreement cut off Iran’s path to a nuclear weapon. In fact, it does the opposite. The deal makes it far easier for Iran to develop nuclear weapons for four basic reasons. First, it allows Iran to continue hiding much of its nuclear research. Second, its main restrictions last for only eight years. Third, it lets Iran continue developing ballistic missiles. And third, it provides billions of dollars in sanctions relief that Iran will use to further its nuclear aims.
The Associated Press reports that world powers will announce a formal deal with Iran in Vienna on Monday. Though there are still minor details to be finalized, the two diplomats who spoke to the AP confirmed that a deal will be reached, though they “cautioned that final details of the pact were still being worked out and a formal agreement still awaits a review from the capitals of the seven nations at the talks.”
SANTA CLARA, California — Former Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Michael Oren recently addressed a packed crowd at the Jewish Community Center (JCC) in Santa Clara where he discussed his latest book Ally: My Journey Across the American-Israeli Divide and the damaged U.S.-Israel relationship under President Barack Obama’s leadership.
A source at the international nuclear talks in Vienna indicates that a deal with Iran is likely on Friday, probably due to a U.S. collapse on a new Iranian demand that an international arms embargo be lifted as part of the deal.
A convicted felon who went to federal prison in 2006-7 is leading a White-House backed effort to lobby Congress to pass whatever nuclear deal emerges from ongoing talks with Iran in Vienna. Robert Creamer, who served time for fraud and tax charges, and who is married to Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), is coordinating pro-Iran efforts through the liberal Ploughshares group, which held a conference call with President Barack Obama’s aides earlier this week, as reported by Adam Kredo of the Washington Free Beacon.
As the list of Western concessions to the Iranian regime continues to grow, Iran is demanding the lifting of a worldwide arms embargo as a condition of any nuclear deal. Thus far, the U.S. is resisting, but Russia and China have already agreed in part.
The debate over providing “fast track” authority for President Barack Obama to negotiate the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) and other trade deals has touched on constitutional, economic, and political arguments. Yet the most important question is whether Obama should be allowed to negotiate anything at all after a dismal track record. When Obama is negotiating with anyone other than congressional Republicans, who fold easily, he makes one bad deal after another.
President Barack Obama’s foreign policy in the Middle East is a failure, but he is responsible for at least one accidental success: bringing Israel and Saudi Arabia, once implacable foes, together in opposition to his agenda. On Thursday, Israel’s Dore Gold, the incoming director of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, appeared in Washington, DC at the Council on Foreign Relations alongisde Anwar Majed Eshki, a former adviser to the Saudi ambassador to the U.S., and revealed secret Israeli-Saudi talks on Iran.
In an exclusive interview with Breitbart News at the South Carolina Freedom Summit this weekend, former New York Governor George Pataki provided a taste of what a Pataki presidency would look like, should he decide to formally enter the increasingly crowded race.
JERUSALEM, Israel — Israeli Minister of Defense Moshe “Bogie” Ya’alon told legal scholars at a conference on the laws of war that terrorists who failed to destroy Israel were resorting to new methods, which included “using our law against us.”
TEL AVIV, Israel — Secretary of State John Kerry appeared on Israeli television over the weekend, telling seven-million-plus Israelis that critics of the emerging Iran deal were guilty of “hysteria.” Israel, which sits a short missile flight away from potentially nuclear-armed Iranian warheads, and which has seen Iranian soldiers along its borders with Syria and Lebanon, has loudly protested the negotiations that the Obama administration has pursued with the Iranian regime.
President Barack Obama attempted on Saturday to dismiss harsh criticism by Iranian leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who had accused the American president last week of “lying” about the terms of the nuclear framework reached in Lausanne, Switzerland earlier this month. Obama tried to explain that Khamenei’s remarks were intended for domestic political purposes: “Even a guy with the title ‘Supreme Leader’ has to be concerned about his own constituencies,” Obama said.
Iranians living in California are deeply skeptical of the emerging nuclear deal announced last week by the Obama administration. Many fled Iran for Southern California during and after the 1979 revolution–some after suffering human rights abuses, and many leaving property and relatives behind in uncertain circumstances.
Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), who is a candidate to succeed retiring Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) as Senate Minority Leader, has reiterated his support for a bipartisan proposal to require President Barack Obama to submit to Congress any nuclear deal with Iran. Because President Barack Obama has promised to veto the legislation–known as the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act–Schumer’s position is seen as a rare moment of dissent. However, there may be less here than meets the eye.
President Barack Obama has granted an interview to National Public Radio in an attempt to sell the Iran “framework” to a skeptical public. In the process, he compares the agreement to a real-estate deal–a poor analogy for a man who called his own last property purchase deal “boneheaded” after involving indicted (now convicted) bag Chicago man Tony Rezko. Obama also provided at least five big reasons that Congress–whose opposition is growing–should reject the Iran deal.
Once again, the Iran deal confirmed by diplomats in Lausanne, Switzerland has failed to materialize. And the only thing more pathetic than the repeated collapse of the talks is the spectacle of U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry staying on, even after diplomats from China, Russia, France and Germany have packed their bags and gone home. He is simply unwilling to admit failure. But the Iranian regime is happy to entertain his illusions, and so their delegation has stayed behind, too.
“An ambitious man might make his own aggrandizement, by the aid of a foreign power, the price of his treachery to his constituents.” Thus did Alexander Hamilton warn the American people, in Federalist No. 75, against allowing the president to make treaties alone.
Travel schedules of Secretary of State John Kerry, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, and Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif suggest that the parties may gather for a “signing” ceremony on Sunday, March 29 in Lausanne, Switzerland.
Iran is refusing to commit to a written nuclear deal ahead of the March 31 deadline that American officials had touted for a general framework to be signed, the New York Times reports.
367 members of the U.S. House of Representatives have sent President Barack Obama a letter expressing concern about the ongoing negotiations with Iran towards a nuclear deal that would keep its nuclear infrastructure in place, as the regime continues to hide information about its nuclear program from international inspectors. Unlike a recent letter sent by 47 Senators to the Iranian leadership, this letter is bipartisan, and more diplomatic–but no less opposed to a “bad deal.”
WESTLAKE, California — As a possible nuclear deal with Iran draws near, Dr. Behzad Tabatabaei addressed a crowded room at the Westlake Village Inn on behalf of the Thousand Oaks Republican Women Federation, where he provided a comprehensive history as to why the regime cannot be trusted.
An Iranian who is living in between the United States and Iran in California told Breitbart News in an exclusive interview that he and many other Iranians who are nationals of the Islamic Republic are selling their U.S. assets in order to increase the supply of U.S. dollars inside of Iran and to help stimulate their country’s economic growth.
House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Rep. Ed Royce (R-CA) and Ranking Member of the Committee Rep. Elliot Engel (D-NY) distributed an undated, bipartisan letter they intend to send to President Barack Obama as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s addresses a joint session of Congress. The letter underscores the widely-held belief that Iran cannot be trusted, particularly when taking into accounting the secretive nature of its past weapons program.
Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee Rep. Ed Royce (R-CA) highlighted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s upcoming address to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday as a critical event and expressed his concern over the unprecedented contention he has been witnessing surrounding Netanyahu’s appearance.
There is a simple question that every critic of Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech to Congress on Tuesday must answer: should he rather wait, as Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko did, and address Congress after suffering a crushing defeat? Or should Netanyahu hasten to warn America before disaster strikes, before a deal is done with Iran that cannot be undone?
Nobel laureate, Holocause survivor, Jewish leader and world literary figure Elie Wiesel will participate in a bipartisan dialogue on the eve of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s controversial speech to a joint session of Congress.
Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) told the U.S. House Committee on Terrorism, Nonproliferation and Trade on Tuesday that the U.S. needed a more aggressive course of action against the Iranian regime.
