As a postscript to my previous post, I want to draw attention to two bits of news that I came across later that day, and to offer brief comments.

Iran’s Foreign Minister, Mohammad-Javad Zarif, addresses the Nuclear Diplomacy Seminar at Allameh University: “We have not had any roll-back, and the structure of the nuclear program has been preserved. The movement forward of the nuclear program towards industrialized [scale] is continuing, and Iran’s activities in Arak and Natanz will continue…We have gained respect for the state. They respect Iran’s behavior, and the calculations of the ill-wishers of the country are in disarray.” FDD Iran Press Review, 2 December 2014

Note the emphasis on avoiding roll-back, which suggests roll-back is an Iranian “red line,” and Zarif’s insistence that halving the number of operating centrifuges at Iran’s disposal would condemn the nuclear negotiation to failure. That may sound worrisome. But it need not be if, as is reportedly the case, Iran is ready to send its low enriched uranium stocks to Russia for use in making fuel for the Bushehr reactor. In those circumstances, avoiding roll-back can be reconciled with US break-out avoidance ambitions, provided these are moderated.

Note too the references to respect. This is a clue to why avoiding roll-back is a “red line.” The leaders of Iran see its nuclear achievements as a symbol of national dignity. For them, nuclear cut-backs would entail humiliation.

This talk of dignity and humiliation may strike some readers as over-sensitive. Britain and the US tend to take their dignity for granted. But remember General Charles de Gaulle, France’s president from 1944-46 and from 1958-69.

For him, the French defeat in 1940 was such a national humiliation that the restoration of French dignity was as much of an objective for him as helping Britain (and later the US) to win the war. Time and again, he tested the patience of his British war-time hosts and allies by making demands or refusing concessions in the interest of upholding French dignity and self-respect.

Now on to a Dec. 2 Reuters report, an excerpt of which I have provided below:

Iran said it has provided evidence to the United Nations atomic agency showing that documents on suspected nuclear bomb research by the country were forged and riddled with errors….

Iran has offered detailed explanations to the IAEA and there has never been “any authenticated documents for PMD claims”, said the Iranian note posted on the agency’s website…..

They “are full of mistakes and contain fake names with specific pronunciations, which only point toward a certain member of the IAEA as their forger”, it said.

Since Nov. 11, 2013, Iran and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) have been cooperating better on the so-called “possible military dimension” (PMD) of the Iranian case. Will this incline the IAEA secretariat to react more forensically than in the past to this latest Iranian dismissal of material allegedly found on a laptop a decade ago? Will they produce and circulate to members of the Board of Governors a reasoned critique of the Iranian “explanations” if, after studying Iran’s grounds for doubt, they continue to believe in the authenticity of the laptop material?

This material has been an obstacle to a peaceful resolution of the Iranian case ever since the IAEA elevated it to a primary concern in early 2008, when all other concerns had been resolved. From the outset people I respect, such as the former Director General of the IAEA, Mohamed ElBaradei, had doubts about its authenticity.

It would be as wrong to find Iran guilty of clandestine nuclear weapon research on the basis of dubious evidence as it would be to condemn a criminal suspect on the basis of dodgy state evidence submitted to secure a conviction.

The IAEA maintains that it has reasons other than the laptop material for suspecting a military dimension to the Iranian case. I am not suggesting that consigning the laptop material to the “too dubious to be useable” file would eliminate that dimension. But I am confident that putting it to one side would simplify the IAEA’s task of bringing this investigation to some kind of resolution.

So much has been written and said about the uranium enrichment aspect of the 14-month nuclear negotiation with Iran that it is hard to look at it with fresh eyes, and starting from first principles. Nonetheless what follows is an attempt to do so. It suggests that the US and Iran are closer on enrichment than once seemed possible, but are still at risk of failing to find common ground in the course of the extension agreed a week ago.

From an international legal perspective the text that matters is the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), to which Iran deposited its last instrument of ratification on 5 March 1970, the same day as the deposit of the US instruments. Under the NPT the US is a “Nuclear Weapon State,” Iran a “Non-Nuclear Weapon State” (NNWS).

The NPT does not prohibit the acquisition of enrichment technology by NNWS. Nor does it impose any limit on the size or number of NNWS enrichment facilities. It merely requires NNWS to use that technology exclusively for peaceful purposes, and to place all the nuclear material fed into and produced by such facilities under International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards.

In the current negotiation, Iran has assured the US that it takes its NPT obligations very seriously. It has also reaffirmed its intention to use enrichment technology exclusively for peaceful purposes, and to continue to implement the NPT safeguards agreement that it concluded in 1975.

Some people assume that such assurances are worthless. They point to the breaches of the NPT safeguards agreement that occurred between approximately1991 and 2003. However, none of those breaches amounted to evidence of an intention to use enrichment for non-peaceful purposes. And US intelligence has yet to come across any such evidence; suspicion of Iranian nuclear weapon intent has rested on inference, not evidence. States, like people, can make mistakes and then resolve not to repeat them.

There are also several resolutions adopted by the UN Security Council (UNSC) between 2006 and 2010 that make legal demands of Iran. But none of them imposes limits on the size and number of Iranian enrichment facilities. Still less do any of them outlaw Iranian possession of enrichment technology for peaceful purposes. One of them requires Iran to cooperate with the IAEA to resolve concern that Iran has engaged in research into nuclear weapon-related technologies. Iran has been doing that since November 2013, albeit with increasing hesitancy.

In the Iranian case another perspective is as important as the legal perspective; it is the confidence-building perspective. This was crucial to an attempt to resolve the problem peacefully in the wake of the IAEA Director General reporting the safeguards breaches to which reference is made above, because these breaches had undermined confidence in Iran’s peaceful intentions.

In the autumn of 2003, Iran volunteered, in the interest of confidence-building, to go beyond the requirements of its NPT safeguards agreement and make available to the IAEA the information and access required by the Additional Protocol (AP). Tehran also undertook to suspend activity at its only enrichment facility while it negotiated longer-term confidence-building measures with the UK, France and Germany (E3). The Iranians implemented these short-term measures scrupulously and ceased doing so only after they had grasped that nothing less than renunciation of the enrichment option would satisfy the E3.

In the current negotiation, various reports suggest that Iran has so far volunteered to renew application of the AP, de facto initially and later de jure; to accept limits on the size and number of its enrichment facilities during a confidence-building period; to refrain from producing uranium enriched to more than 5% U235; to convert some of its under 5% U235 uranium (LEU) into forms in which it would not be readily available as feed material; and to send the rest of its LEU stock to Russia for use in the fuel that the Rosatom corporation is supplying to the power reactor at Bushehr. Iran’s negotiators also have reportedly suggested that they are ready to extend the Bushehr fuel supply contract well beyond 2021.

In parallel, Iran has negotiated that Rosatom will help build two further power reactors and will supply them with fuel throughout their operating lives.

In confidence-building terms, this amounts to an impressive package. With only 10,000 IR-1 centrifuges in operation in only one facility, and its LEU stock unavailable to serve as feed material, Iran would need at least six months to produce enough highly enriched uranium (HEU) for one nuclear device. With only 8000 IR-1s and no LEU feed, Iran would need at least eight months.

And if the Bushehr supply contract were extended to 2031, Iran would only need to consider increasing the available quantity of separative work units (a measure of centrifuge output) in the late 2020s.

In other words, Iran is offering a package that exceeds its NPT obligations by a wide margin. IAEA inspectors would be able to acquire confidence that there are no undeclared nuclear activities or material in Iran. The international community would know that it had six to eight months at least to react to any sign of Iranian misuse of its enrichment capacity for non-peaceful purposes.

So why in Vienna did it seem that this package is not enough for the US? That is for representatives of the US administration to explain. Past statements suggest that they will say that they need certainty that Iran will be incapable of producing (“cannot”) even one nuclear weapon.

That may sound reasonable but is in fact an unrealistic goal. It would require Iran not only to destroy all its centrifuges but also to wipe the minds of its engineers clean of all their knowledge and experience of enrichment technology. It also puts the negotiation at risk of the same fate as the 2003-5 E3 negotiation, because Iran is unready to build confidence by closing down its enrichment program. And it runs counter to the spirit of the NPT, since the NPT bases nuclear non-proliferation on self-restraint, political will, and deterrence through verification, not on nuclear technology surrender.

If instead the administration admits that it cannot literally “close all pathways” to a weapon but claims that it needs at least 12 months to react to any break-out attempt, then they should be asked why six to eight months would not be enough.

It is self-evident that 12 months of additional sanctions would not cause Iran to abandon a break-out attempt. Eight years of sanctions have failed to persuade Iran to re-suspend enrichment. Post-1918 history is littered with failed sanctions policies.

On the other hand, 12 months are more than are needed to get UN Security Council approval for the use of force to prevent break-out and to act on it—or for a coalition of the willing to form in the unlikely event of Russia or China threatening to veto a UNSC resolution. In 1990, only six months were needed for the US to gain approval for and prepare a massive operation to drive Saddam Hussein out of Kuwait. As recently as last April, Secretary John Kerry was formulating the goal as “six to 12 months.”

This analysis will be misconstrued by some as an apologia for Iran. Others will realize, I hope, that it is an attempt to clarify the progress that has been made on enrichment over the last 12 months; to explain why the current Iranian offer is reasonable from a legal and from a confidence-building perspective; and to counter the pernicious influence on US negotiating goals of people who want the bar set so high that Iran will refuse the jump.

by Peter Jenkins

Seyed Hossein Mousavian, the lead author of Iran and the United States: An Insider’s View on the Failed Past and the Road to Peace, has two objectives: to help American readers understand the Iranian perspective on the fraught US-Iranian relationship, and to advocate a sustained attempt to break the cycle of hostility that was triggered by the 1979 Islamic revolution.

Such is the suspicion on both sides of this relationship that some readers may wonder about the extent to which Mousavian’s descriptions of the Iranian perspective can be trusted. This reviewer’s opinion is that Mousavian—a former Iranian ambassador who has been living in the US since 2009—whom the reviewer has known since 2004, is not trying to pull wool over anyone’s eyes. There is corroborating evidence for much of the information he advances. If in places the reader senses that he or she is not getting the full story, a respectable explanation is to hand: those who have worked at the heart of a government, as Mousavian has done, are bound to be “economical” with certain truths, as a British cabinet secretary once put it.

The Iranian political establishment can be reduced, simplistically, to two broad currents. The first contains those who nurture so great a sense of grievance towards the US, and so deep a mistrust, that they have no wish to end the intermittent cold war of the last 35 years. In the second current are those who understand that nurturing grievances is futile, who recognise that the US has legitimate grievances of its own, and who believe that a measure of détente is in the interest of both countries.

Mousavian belongs to the second current. So do Iran’s president since August 2013, Hassan Rouhani, and his foreign minister and chief nuclear negotiator, Mohammed Javad Zarif. Iran’s ultimate decision-maker and religious leader, Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei, straddles the two camps. He is deeply distrustful of the United States, which he suspects of being bent on the overthrow of the Islamic Republic and of having no interest in détente, but he is ready to give the second current opportunities to prove him wrong.

Iran’s president from 2005-13, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad—who created a deplorable impression in the West, and gifted Israeli propagandists, by denying the reality of the Holocaust—came to office as a member of the first current, a “hard-liner.” But one of the revelations of this book is that he made more attempts than any previous leader to engineer a thaw in relations with the United States.

Mousavian’s intriguing thesis is that Ahmadinejad believed that achieving détente would be so popular with Iranian voters that it would help him to become Iran’s equivalent of Vladimir Putin.

Amb. Mousavian was the spokesman for Iran in the negotiations over its nuclear program with the international community 2003-05.

The middle section of the book is given over to an account of the US-Iranian relationship from the author’s first-hand experience. Mousavian does not flinch from addressing all the episodes that have generated a sense of grievance on one side or the other, from cataloguing the false starts and missed opportunities, or from exploring the incidents that have set back relations just when an improvement seemed to be in the offing.

He has been so well connected to several leaders of Iran’s nezam (establishment) during most of the last 35 years that these chapters amount to a fascinating story, told from the inside of a political system that many foreigners find opaque.

It is somewhat remarkable how often relations have been set back just when it seemed that a thaw was about to set in. In 1992, intelligence about Iranian nuclear purchases undermined the good will created by Iran’s intercessions to secure the release of US hostages in the Lebanon. In 1996, the Kolahdooz incident set back relations with Europe that had been improving since the early 90s. In 2002, the Karine A incident negated the cooperation that the US had been receiving from Iran since 9/11, and it led to the infamous naming of Iran as a member of the “Axis of Evil” in a State of the Union address.

Mousavian suspects that these and other setbacks were not coincidental; they were the work of people who had no interest in a thaw. That theory would account for the haste with which Iran’s enemies have asserted Iranian responsibility for such incidents. But in the last analysis, answers to these puzzles of responsibility have yet to be authenticated.

In any case, how realistic is it to suppose that an improvement in US-Iran relations can be achieved?

Mousavian admits that there are formidable obstacles to a full normalisation, and he seems to doubt that the US and Iran will become best buddies any time soon.

Chief among the obstacles, seen from the US side, are Iran’s refusal to modify its view that the Jewish character of the Israeli state, proclaimed in Israel’s constitution, is bound to result in injustice, oppression and humiliation for Palestinians living in Israel, and has in fact done so—plus Iran’s determination to support a fellow-Shia movement that Israel and the US deem to be terrorist, Hezbollah.

On the Iranian side, Ayatollah Khamenei fears the consequences of anything more than a modest rapprochement. In his view, the opening of a US embassy in Tehran, for instance, would create opportunities for US subversion of the Islamic Republic; and greater exposure of the Iranian population to all things American would undermine respect for Islamic values. He remains convinced that the US seeks the overthrow of the Islamic Republic.

Yet Mousavian believes that there is a middle ground between mutual hostility and full normalisation. He sees scope for the US and Iran to work together, on a basis of mutual respect, to achieve common objectives in areas where their interests coincide. At present those areas include Afghanistan, counter-narcotics, WMD counter-proliferation, energy security, and combating the Jihadi threat in Iraq and Syria.

Developing what Mousavian terms “a framework for cooperation” should be accompanied, he suggests, by an agreement to lock the drawer that contains both sides’ equally long lists of historic grievances, and by a commitment to eschew the rhetoric of enmity and aggression.

The key to taking relations on to a new plane, he argues, is resolving the dispute over Iran’s nuclear activities. This dispute has been fuelled by Israel, partly perhaps for Palestine-related reasons, and by the US’ strategic balance of power considerations.

He believes that a resolution is nonetheless possible. The progress made by American and Iranian negotiators since September 2013, and the alarm that this has caused Israel’s prime minister, suggests that he is right.

Mousavian warns his readers against pressing Iran to cut back its uranium enrichment capacity from the current level, which, objectively, is modest and cannot reasonably be construed as threatening as long as its use is monitored by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). He fears that the US and EU negotiators will fail to appreciate the cultural and psychological factors that would lead the Iranian nezam to prefer no deal to the kind of capacity reductions that the US and EU have been seeking.

The Islamic Republic is rooted in nationalist as much as in religious values, he explains. The nezam is quick to perceive threats to Iran’s sovereignty and national dignity. They would rather defy than be humiliated. They are ready to engage in reasonable compromise but they will not capitulate.

It is these insights into the Islamic Iranian mind-set that are likely to make this book exceptionally interesting for all but students of Iran—and even they may like to compare their views with those of Mousavian.

He will doubtless be pleased if the book sells well, as it deserves to do. But what will please him most, I suspect, is if it contributes to a better understanding of Iran in the US and in Europe, and if it helps bring to a close a quarrel that reflects well on neither side.

Follow LobeLog on Twitter and like us on Facebook

by Peter Jenkins

The absence of any late September breakthrough on the central issue in the nuclear negotiation with Iran—Iran’s mastery of uranium enrichment, a technology that can be used for both civil and military purposes—has triggered speculation that the November 24 deadline for a comprehensive agreement will be missed. It has also sparked renewed debate on whether no deal would be better than the best deal likely to be on offer…

The nub of the enrichment problem appears to be Iran’s reluctance to give up the potential to produce enough highly enriched uranium (HEU) for one nuclear weapon (a “significant quantity” or SQ) in a matter of weeks (perhaps four to six). This puts Iran greatly at odds with the US and EU (and possibly Russia and China, but that is unclear), since the US and EU want Iran to be unable to produce an SQ (to “breakout”) in less than six months and would prefer at least a year.

This wide gap on enrichment and the lack of any reason to think that Iran’s negotiators will budge on this point are feeding speculation that agreement by the deadline will be unattainable.The underlying assumption is that the US and EU will not budge either.

I have accepted a poisoned chalice from the editors of Lobelog and will try with the following points to explain why tolerating the Iranian operation of nine or ten thousand—let’s say 10,000—first generation centrifuges (IR-1s) would be the lesser of two evils—the greater evil being no deal—provided it paves the way to a satisfactory settlement of all the other points on the agenda.

1) In the long run the US and EU will have to rely for a non-proliferation assurance, where Iran’s nuclear program is concerned, on the deterrence provided by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) monitoring of compliance with Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) obligations, and on Iranian fear that the consequences of non-compliance could be devastating. Perpetual restrictions on centrifuge numbers would imply a perpetual double standard for which there is no basis in international law—and would therefore be totally unacceptable to Iran.

The US and EU tell themselves that relying solely on deterrence will feel more comfortable in ten or twenty years time, because during the intervening years Iran will have been able to build confidence in the peaceful nature of its intentions. In doing so, they tend to overlook that since 2003 the IAEA has not reported any Iranian failure to declare the possession of nuclear material and has not detected any undeclared nuclear activities. Nor has Iran attempted to produce HEU during the last four years, when it could easily have done so.

These years could be seen as evidence of Iran’s intention to comply with its nuclear non-proliferation obligations, and as grounds for confidence that it will not seek to breakout in the coming ten years…

The US and EU may also be overlooking that, if ten years from now Iran has had the potential to breakout in under six weeks but has not attempted to do so, then that will be a stronger reason for confidence in its peaceful intentions than if rapid breakout had not been a possibility.

2) A sense of perspective can be obtained by reflecting that several NPT Non-Nuclear-Weapon States (NNWS) have been and are in a position to breakout rapidly and that this is not generally considered cause for concern. Why not? Because it is assumed that they have no intention of acquiring nuclear weapons. Nearly 30 years after Iran, also an NPT party, was first in contact with the A.Q. Khan nuclear supply network, to obtain enrichment technology, there is still no conclusive evidence that Iran intends to acquire nuclear weapons. Indeed, the US intelligence assessment is that no such decision has been taken.

3) The risk of Iran using the 10,000 centrifuges that it wants to retain to breakout is small. IAEA monitoring, and the impossibility of predicting the consequences of detection are deterrents. If Iran wanted one SQ of HEU, it would be better advised to try to build a small unmonitored enrichment facility to house more efficient second- or third-generation centrifuges.

(In that case, some might ask, why are the Iranians so determined to retain a capacity to produce one SQ in a matter of weeks at a monitored facility? In my view, the explanation must be that they want a quasi-deterrent. Being known to be able to breakout rapidly is not much of a deterrent but it is better than nothing—and it has the merit of not entailing any violation of the NPT.)

4) The US and EU reason that a reaction time of at least six months is needed in the event of a detected breakout, to allow the UN Security Council or a coalition of the like-minded to go through the gears before stopping Iran short of one SQ by destroying its means of production. Going through the gears means first persuasion and then coercion (sanctions). But it is highly unlikely that in breakout circumstances even good friends could persuade Iran to turn back; and there is now ample evidence that the greatest effect of sanctions is to stimulate Iranian defiance.

So in reality the US and EU, faced with evidence of an ongoing breakout, would have only one option: to destroy the 10,000 centrifuges as quickly as possible (unless, when it came to the crunch, the consequences of such action seemed likely to be worse than tolerating Iranian acquisition of HEU). To render the 10,000 centrifuges at Natanz inoperable would be an easy task for the US Air Force, and could be accomplished in well under a month.

The ministers of Iran and the P5+1 at the signing ceremony of the Joint Plan of Action reached on Nov. 24, 2013.

5) Assuming that other outstanding issues can be resolved satisfactorily, a comprehensive agreement on Nov. 24 offers a much fairer prospect than no agreement. A final agreement that includes the following provisions will generate a helpful reduction in tensions on at least one Middle Eastern front: frequent IAEA access to Iranian centrifuge workshops and assembly areas, and to Iranian fuel cycle facilities; changes to the design of the 40 MW reactor at Arak; and all the enrichment-related restrictions Iran offered in November 2013 and that Iran could hardly retract under a comprehensive agreement.

However imperfect, in Western eyes, such an agreement might seem if Iran continues to operate 10,000 IR-1s, it would be a better platform for developing the West’s relations with Iran in positive ways than no agreement. If Iran were given sufficient time, were offered EU as well as Russian civil nuclear cooperation, and were invited to join the Nuclear Suppliers Group, it might decide to adapt its nuclear program in reassuring ways. An agreement would ease political inhibitions to cooperation when Western and Iranian security interests coincide.

Conversely, no agreement could lead quickly to renewed expansion of Iran’s enrichment capacities, a reduction in IAEA access to the minimum required by the NPT, abandonment of the plan to modify the Arak reactor, and who knows what else on a broader canvas.

Those who have been advocating “no deal” seem to assume that a nice alternative would be on offer: continuation of the confidence-building measures that have been in place since January under last November’s Joint Plan of Action. But there is no guarantee that this would be the case.

To date, Iran’s gains in return for those measures have been modest (US and EU sanctions relief having been paltry and, in some cases, ineffective); they would not lose a lot by walking away from the Joint Plan. US and EU negotiators could also find it hard to detain them—their negotiating hand is weaker than “no deal” advocates imagine. If it were strong, this problem would have been resolved to Western satisfaction years ago.

Of course it would be wise of Iran to bear in mind that it will be very hard for the Obama administration to persuade Congress of the merits of a deal that does not make it impossible for Iran to breakout in under six months (irritating though it is for foreigners to be told by US negotiators that Congress will or will not tolerate this or that). It is a regrettable reality that this breakout issue has become totemic. The Iranian negotiators ought to be trying to identify room for compromise on some aspect of it. If they could find some way of excluding the option of using Iran’s stock of low enriched uranium as centrifuge feed material in a breakout, this would extend potential breakout estimates by several months. However, it would also make a quasi-deterrent less impressive. That may put this option on the wrong side of an Iranian “red line.”

Better Deal?

I can see that US and EU negotiators face a very difficult choice. They are not to be envied. All their instincts drive them in the direction of depriving Iran of an option (uranium enrichment) that other NPT parties enjoy. So often since 1979 the Islamic Republic has behaved in ways that have alarmed the West, or offended our moral sensibilities, that it is hard for us to leave Iran in possession of the capacity to make a nuclear weapon.

But, as Senator Dianne Feinstein reminded her colleagues in January, the nature of a nation can change over time. The Islamic Republic has sometimes shown scant regard for international law, not least breaching its IAEA obligations over more than a decade prior to 2003, but it does not follow that they are bent on using their enrichment capability to acquire nuclear weapons. There are plenty of reasons why it would be foolish for them to do so. And, frankly, it is not obvious that the US and EU will have a better option on Nov. 24 than to cut a deal on the basis of Iran continuing to operate 10,000 centrifuges.

Follow LobeLog on Twitter and like us on Facebook

by Peter Jenkins

The Prime Minister of Israel addressed the UN General Assembly on Sept. 29, once more filling the chamber with fire and brimstone.

Like many a leader before him, he built his speech on the well-tried formula that attack is the best form of defense.

Not for him to make any attempt to justify Israel’s settlement of 500,000 Israelis in occupied territory on the West Bank. Not for him to accept any share of responsibility for the collapse of the peace talks into which Secretary of State John Kerry invested so much energy and good intention. Not for him to explain why Israel has failed to follow Syria’s example in adhering to the Chemical Weapons Convention and continues to resist pressure to move towards a Middle East free of nuclear weapons.

Instead, Mr. Netanyahu set out to distract attention from Israeli shortcomings, and to win sympathy, by persuading his listeners that the greatest embodiments of evil in the Middle East are Hamas and the Islamic government in Iran.

Hamas and Iran, he asks listeners to believe, are no different from the group that calls itself the Islamic State (IS). All three are vessels of militant Islam. All three crave global domination. All three have embraced a fanatic ideology; their mad belief in a master faith invites comparison with the Nazi belief in a master race.

The comparison with Nazi Germany begs a question: will militant Islam ever have the power to realize its unbridled ambitions? Mr. Netanyahu believes that it will, unless stopped short, because he continues to believe that Iran is determined to acquire nuclear weapons. For him, the current Iranian show of moderation and commitment to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) is merely a manipulative charm offensive, designed to persuade the US and its allies to lift sanctions and remove obstacles on Iran’s path to acquiring nuclear weapons.

There is a steadfast quality to Mr. Netanyahu that compels admiration. The US intelligence community has estimated since 2007 that Iran no longer has a nuclear weapon program. Several senior Israeli intelligence and military officials have allowed the public to learn that they share the US assessment. Western leaders have decided that they can afford to risk domestic criticism by negotiating an agreement that will leave Iran in possession of uranium enrichment technology, since that is not outlawed by the NPT. Yet, still, Mr. Netanyahu clings to the view he first voiced 22 years ago: Iran wants enrichment facilities because it wants nuclear weapons.

That said, some evolution in his thinking is discernible. He is no longer prophesying that Iran is on the brink of achieving its nuclear weapon ambition; instead, it is at “a time of its choosing” that Iran “the world’s most dangerous regime, in the world’s most dangerous region”, will obtain “the world’s most dangerous weapon” unless its “military nuclear capabilities” are fully dismantled. He is no longer calling on his US allies to put themselves on the wrong side of international law by conducting a pre-emptive attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities. And he is no longer suggesting that a nuclear-armed Iran would transfer nuclear weapons or material to non-state actors such as IS and Hamas.

It is only in the second part of his speech that Mr. Netanyahu starts to play defense—but, still, he misses no opportunity to go onto the counter-attack.

His initial purpose is to justify the latest Israeli attack on Gaza. His method is simple: heap all the responsibility for the terrible loss of Palestinian non-combatant life on to Hamas; cast a veil over the causes of this outbreak of violence; imply that ordinary Israelis suffered as much as ordinary Palestinians; and suggest that the end, Israeli security, justifies the means even when threats to Israeli security result from Israeli policies and practices.

He reserves one of his most savage counter-attacks for the UN Human Rights Council. He accuses the Council of granting legitimacy to the use of human shields and of becoming a “terrorist rights council.” He even seems to imply that by criticising Israeli policies the Council is guilty of anti-Semitism, as are all those, wherever they may be, who criticise Israel.

He ends with a call on Sunni Arab states to form a common front with Israel against a “nuclear-armed Iran” and militant Islamist movements. This, he claims, can help facilitate peace between Israel and the Palestinians.

The peace he envisages, however, appears to be built on continuing Israeli occupation of the West Bank: “I’m ready to make a historic compromise, not because Israel occupies a foreign land. The people of Israel are not occupiers in the land of Israel. History, archaeology and common sense all make clear that we have had a singular attachment to this land for over 3,000 years….The old template for peace must be updated. It must take into account new realities.”

Does he really believe that Saudi Arabia and Egypt can afford to be seen siding with Israel to deprive Palestinians of lands to which their title under international law is of the strongest? Israelis may have been in occupation of those lands 3,000 years ago. But subsequently, for nearly 2,000 years, others occupied them. That fact cannot be orated away.

Follow LobeLog on Twitter and like us on Facebook

A lie gets halfway around the world before the truth has time to get its pants on. –Winston Churchill

Opponents of a nuclear agreement with Iran are mobilising once more. A recent letter to colleagues from the chairman and ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee sponsored by Ed Royce (R-CA) and Eliot Engel (D-NY) contains almost as many distortions of the truth as the annual address to the UN General Assembly of the current Prime Minister of Israel.

Here are some of those distortions.

Iran’s nuclear program poses a severe threat to the national security of the United States and our allies. How can the nuclear program of a state that is not known to possess nuclear weapons and is assessed by US intelligence not to have taken a decision to acquire nuclear weapons pose a severe threat? Do the comparable nuclear programs of Brazil and Japan pose a severe threat to their neighbours? Does Israel’s nuclear program pose a severe threat to its neighbours?

For several years, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has sought Iran’s cooperation regarding evidence that Tehran has conducted extensive research and development on a nuclear weapon. What the IAEA has reported is evidence of research, not of development. And some of that evidence is open to non-nuclear interpretations. The possibility that some of it has been fabricated cannot be excluded.

Last November, Iran agreed to disclose information on such “potential military dimensions” to the IAEA. Last November Iran agreed to “resolve all outstanding issues that have not already been resolved by the IAEA”. In the Nov. 11, 2013 agreement there is no reference to a “possible military dimension”. The relevant part of subsequent IAEA reports is headed “Clarification of Unresolved Issues.”

Iran has failed to fully cooperate with the IAEA and has failed to meet its latest deadline. Iran has failed, partially, to meet a recent deadline but the Director General of the IAEA has not reported any failure to cooperate.

We remain deeply concerned with Iran’s refusal to fully cooperate with the International Atomic Energy Agency. The Director General of the IAEA has not reported any failure to cooperate. In all manner of processes the missing of deadlines is liable to occur.

For several years, the IAEA has attempted to work with Iran to resolve this central issue, but Tehran has refused. In February 2012 Iran agreed with the IAEA a plan of work for resolving outstanding issues. After a change of government in Iran, in November 2013, Iran and the IAEA agreed to a Framework for Cooperation. Since November 2013 Iran has provided the access and information requested by the IAEA on 16 out of 18 occasions.

In its September 5, 2014 report, the IAEA stated that Iran had failed to meet its latest deadline, even as it continued to demolish structures and construct others at the Parchin military base, where clandestine nuclear-related activities have reportedly taken place. The latest IAEA report is devoid of any linkage between the recent missing of a deadline and construction work at the Parchin military site.

If Iran’s nuclear program is truly peaceful, “it’s not a hard proposition to prove.” Actually it’s a very hard proposition to prove. How can a state “prove” that it does not have some small secret fissile material production facility somewhere on its territory? That is why the IAEA is never ready to offer more than “credible assurances” that a given nuclear program is truly peaceful.

The only reasonable conclusion for its stonewalling of international investigators is that Tehran does indeed have much to hide. That Iran may have something to hide is a reasonable conclusion. But it is not the only reasonable conclusion.

We are concerned that an agreement that accepts Iran’s lack of transparency on this key issue would set the dangerous precedent that certain facilities and aspects of Iran’s nuclear program can be declared off limits by Tehran. Iran is under an international legal obligation to submit all nuclear facilities where nuclear material is present to IAEA inspection. There is not the remotest possibility that the current negotiation with the US and others will result in their trying to persuade the IAEA Board of Governors that certain Iranian facilities should be excluded from the scope of Iran’s safeguards agreement with the IAEA.

Both the IAEA Board of Governors and the IAEA secretariat are determined to resolve questions that have arisen in relation to what the IAEA terms “nuclear-related” research in Iran, most of which is thought to have taken place, if at all, more than ten years ago. The IAEA secretariat is highly competent and knows its job. Its task will not be facilitated by the circulation of misleading information about the nature of Iran’s participation in that resolution process.

Photo: The Israeli Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu with US Rep. Ed Royce (left) and US Rep. Eliot L. Engel in Jerusalem