Tag: Iran Terrorism

Iran Should Fear the Reaper


Awesome thoughts on President Trump defending American interests against Iranian aggression even in the face of Dem Party cowardice as the Left trembles assuming despicable Iran will escalate toward military confrontation. Justin Smith nails it!

 

JRH 1/7/20

Your generosity is always appreciated:

Please Support NCCR

Or support by getting in the Coffee from home business – 

OR just buy some FEEL GOOD coffee.

 

Blog Editor: Rather than capitulate to Facebook censorship by abandoning the platform, I choose to post and share until the Leftist censors ban me. Recently, the Facebook censorship tactic I’ve experienced is a couple of Group shares then jailed under the false accusation of posting too fast. So I ask those that read this, to combat censorship by sharing blog and Facebook posts with your friends or Groups you belong to.

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

Iran Should Fear the Reaper 

A Resolute Defense of America

 

By Justin O. Smith

Sent 1/5/2020 1:54 PM

 

Making a fine and righteous decision, President Donald J. Trump gave the order **Statement by the Department of Defense for an airstrike, conducted near Baghdad International Airport on January 3rd 2020, in retaliation for the U.S. contractor killed at the K1 Iraqi base by Kata’ib Hezbollah^^, and the President’s quick response sent Iran’s Quds Force^^^ General Qassem Soleimani to the hell he had earned here on earth, as the leader of the world’s largest terrorist organization, tearing his body apart. The strike also took Iraq’s Abu [Mahdi] al-Muhandis [CEP Profile & JPost Profile], deputy commander of Iran-backed militias in Iraq — the Popular Mobilization Forces†† — and twenty-five others, including the PMF protocol officer, Mohammed Reda. This was an end that was far from anything resembling justice, because it was much too swift and much too humane for a monster, and his fellow terrorists, who had caused so much destruction, misery and death around the globe, including the deaths of at least 603 U.S. soldiers; however, it did deliver a hard blow to international terrorism.

 

^^[Blog Editor: Info on Islamic Terrorists Kata’ib Hezbollah:

 

 

 

 

 

^^^[Blog Editor: Info on Iran’s Quds Force:

 

 

 

 

††[Blog Editor: Info on Popular Mobilization Forces:

 

 

 

 

After the PMF had failed in an attempt to overrun the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, on New Year’s Eve [Military Times info], President Trump delivered a threat to Iran to cease its efforts to destabilize the area or prepare to “be held fully responsible for lives lost, or damage incurred, at any of our facilities,” and “pay a very Big Price. This is not a warning; it is a Threat. Happy New Year!”

 

“You can’t do anything,” responded Ayatollah Khamenei, Iran’s Supreme Leader. The next day, President Trump showed him different.

 

Shortly after the airstrike, President Trump took to the airways to deliver the news to the American people. In part, his message read as follows: “We took the action last night to stop war. We did not take the action to start a war. I have deep respect for the Iranian people. They are a remarkable people with an incredible heritage and unlimited potential. We do not seek regime change. However, the Iranian regime’s aggression in the region, including the use of proxy fighters to destabilize its neighbors must end and it must end now. The future belongs to the people of Iran, those who seek peaceful coexistence and cooperation, not the terrorist warlords, who plunder their nation to finance bloodshed abroad.”

 

Many of the Leftist Democrats, such as Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senator Chuck Schumer were deeply distressed that they weren’t notified that the President was preparing to take such action. However, as Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) noted on Fox News: The last group of people you want to talk to about this is Democrats in Congress, Republicans in Congress … To all those Democrats who are criticizing the President, I was aware of what his options were. They were about to unleash holy hell on our people in Iraq and throughout the region, and the President decisively took action.” [Similar in Senator Graham Press Release]

 

Quick as a hard rain, a number of the usual critics, leftist Trump haters and anti-interventionist Trump supporters, decried the action, as a move that will result in a significantly fearsome Iranian retaliation against America and its allies and a possible recklessly risked all-out war with Iran. They assume the U.S. will be drawn into a broader conflict similar to what unfolded in Afghanistan and Iraq; but, these people have obviously been stranded on a deserted island for the past four decades, because Iran has really been at war with the U.S. since 1979.

 

Since the Islamic Republic of Iran was created in 1979, the Quds Force has actively wreaked havoc across the globe, in countries like Bosnia, Kenya, Turkey, Bahrain, Germany, and it was even the bad actor behind the brazen failed plot in 2011 to assassinate the Saudi Arabian Ambassador on U.S. soil, just as its IED’s maimed and killed hundreds of U.S. soldiers and Marines in both Afghanistan and Iraq at the peak of the wars, as Iran worked against our efforts there, initially; it was also responsible for the bombing of the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia, in 1996, that took the lives of nineteen Americans; and, the Quds Force has planned bombings in Kenya and Germany, just to name a few of the many acts of terrorism that have the Quds Force’s signature.

 

The Supreme Leader and General Qassem Soleimani, who was more powerful than Iran’s president in foreign policy matters and controlled billions of dollars in terror financing across the world, were responsible for the only true act of war in this latest Iranian misadventure.  They put boots on the ground in Iraq for the purpose of planning and directing attacks against U.S. diplomats and U.S. forces, that are lawfully in country by the authority of Congress and with the Iraqi government’s permission, and those U.S. forces have a right and a duty to defend their positions, against all threats, especially those from enemy commanders directing Iranian backed militias to attack them in a combat zone; they could and they did lawfully remove the threat Soleimani represented, when they killed him, as a legal act against an enemy combatant under the rules of war, and President Trump’s action was Constitutionally legitimate and a stunning counter-move, not an assassination.

 

A cold-blooded killer, the hardliner of hardliners, a constant shadowy figure in the Middle East, and Iran’s indispensable man, Qassem Soleimani had enormous control over the entire global Islamic terror network, overseeing operations and executing Iran’s geopolitical vision, since he also ran proxies in Yemen, Syria, Iraq, and Lebanon, appearing where conflicts rage and disappearing just as quickly. Between 2011 and 2013 alone, he had planned thirty separate terror attacks, and prior to this, he had orchestrated terror attacks in Thailand, New Delhi, Lagos and Nairobi, honing his skills with ruthless cunning. And taken in its entirety, as the head of the Quds Force’s irregular warfare and intelligence arm, Soleimani’s death was bigger than that of Osama bin Laden and Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, and his killing marks a major escalation with Tehran, that has been long overdue, and it signifies a new era in U.S. relations with Iran.

 

On January 2nd 2020, telling reporters that Islamic violence by Iranian backed Shiite militias in Iraq will be met with U.S. force and countermeasures, Defense Secretary Mark Esper declared, “The game has changed.”

 

In an interview with Fox News on January 3rd 2020, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo stated: “We don’t seek war with Iran. But we, at the same time, are not going to stand by and watch the Iranians escalate and continue to put American lives at risk without responding in a way that disrupts, defends, deters and creates an opportunity to de-escalate the situation.”

 

The leadership hierarchy of Iran condemned the attack, as Iran’s Foreign Minister Javad Zarif called Soleimani’s killing “an act of international terrorism.” The Supreme Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said, “A severe retaliation awaits the murderers who have the blood of Soleimani and that of the other martyrs on their hands”, and according to Iran’s state-owned newspaper, Hamshari, for the first time ever, Khamenei took part in an emergency meeting of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, vowing to avenge Soleimani’s killing.

 

In reality, nobody knows for certain what happens from this point on, not even those in making the decisions, who are weighing out the costs and the benefits to some of their next steps. Make no mistake. The Iranian ayatollahs and mullahs are not completely suicidal, although that dynamic is at play; but in the course of waging their jihad against the West, they are mostly calculating and strategic, so the chances for an all-out direct war between Iran and the United States is low, at the present time.

 

Although President Trump’s hardened sanctions are now bringing some real economic pain to Iran and its leaders, Iran has paid a very small price for all the innocent blood it has shed over the past four decades, while it increased its global reach and influence and achieved greater military capabilities, as it developed a nuclear weapons program and acted aggressively, belligerently and violently against America and Her Allies. The strike that ended General Qassem Soleimani’s life has rocked the Iranian regime to its core.

 

Over the decades, past administrations have been overly patient with Iran and engaged them only through proxies in Saudi Arabia, Iraq and Israel, and although President Trump followed with substantial restraint and respect for the Iranian regime, always leaving the door open to negotiations towards better relations, that restraint was viewed by Tehran as proof of the Trump administration’s lack of will to respond. Their miscalculations and overreach in Iraq resulted in Soleimani’s death, as President Trump engaged them directly for the first time, since the Reagan administration, and he proved America will meet their attacks with overwhelming force, when deemed necessary, without fighting proxy wars.

 

Reported by Victor Garcia on January 4th (Fox News), President Trump made a statement that read: “Iran is talking very boldly about targeting certain USA assets as revenge for our ridding the world of their terrorist leader who had just killed and American [and] badly wounded many others, not to mention all of the people he had killed over his lifetime, including recently hundreds of Iranian protesters. [Soleimani] was already attacking our Embassy, and preparing for additional hits in other locations. Iran has been nothing but problems for many years. Let this serve as a WARNING that if Iran strikes any Americans, or American assets, we have targeted 52 Iranian sites (representing the 52 American hostages taken by Iran many years ago) some at a very high level (and) important to Iran [and] the Iranian culture, and Iran itself, WILL BE HIT VERY FAST AND VERY HARD. The USA wants no more threats!”

 

Iran does have sleeper agents in America, and it also holds the largest arsenal of all types of missiles capable of striking our forces anywhere in the region, but these facts should not make us throw up our hands in surrender and let Iran intimidate us into meekly accepting whatever Iran seeks to do there and elsewhere in the world, because the policies of appeasement are precisely what has led to the current reality. Those hysterical voices adamantly asserting President Trump’s airstrike has set us on a path of all-out war are the same voices in the Middle East who were directly responsible for aiding and enabling Iran to the point that Iran could now pose such a dire threat.

 

Normally averse to war, President Trump has obviously been prepared for this moment for much of his presidency, and the American people should not overact to the notion of an escalation, since Iran’s economy is shot and its military power, both in conventional and terrorist ranks, is eroding. While President Trump can effectively use America’s massive military power, he has only ever sought to prevent Iran from dramatically escalating hostilities to the point of a catastrophic response, such as Iran now understands it will face; and, regardless of how Soleimani’s death has changed Iran’s strategic calculations, President Trump’s actions demonstrate he is intent on bringing peace through strength and a resolute defense of U.S. interests and America against any who threaten Her.

 

Americans should note the incongruity and the hypocrisy, the double standard employed by Democrats, who castigated President Trump’s decision not to intervene in Turkey’s genocide against the Kurds and now harshly damn him for properly reacting in Iraq to protect Americans. President Trump faced a determined enemy and sent their blood-thirsty commander to hell, no virgins in paradise, by way of the fire and fury of an American MQ-9 Reaper drone.

 

By Justin O. Smith

++++++++++++++++++++++

Blog Editor: Rather than capitulate to Facebook censorship by abandoning the platform, I choose to post and share until the Leftist censors ban me. Recently, the Facebook censorship tactic I’ve experienced is a couple of Group shares then jailed under the false accusation of posting too fast. So I ask those that read this, to combat censorship by sharing blog and Facebook posts with your friends or Groups you belong to.

_____________________

Edited by John R. Houk

Text embraced by brackets and source links except by the indication ** are by the Editor.

 

© Justin O. Smith

 

Trump Nixes Iran Nuke Deal


VIDEO: Trump Announces U.S. Withdrawal From Iran Nuclear Deal

 

Posted by Washington Free Beacon

Published on May 8, 2018

 

John R. Houk, Blog Editor

© May 9, 2018

 

Yesterday President Trump did a magnificent thing. He ended former President Obama’s (the next Benedict Arnold at worst or Aaron Burr at best) so-called Iran Nuke Deal that only delayed a nuclear armed Iran. Obama’s lie: the deal prevented a nuclear armed Iran.

 

Traitors: Benedict Arnold, Aaron Burr & Obama

 

President Trump’s election mandate from my perspective is to unravel all the damning acts Obama’s designs to fundamentally transform America into a State supremacist Socialist nation where the People are told how to think rather than the People telling the government how to act.

 

Stopping to put trust in Iran’s criminal Islamofascist Shi’ite ruling elite is not only a great thing for American National Interests, but also for the people of Western Nations that have benefitted from actual free elections deciding their national path.

 

ONE THING to keep in mind: The Iran Nuke Deal was NOT a treaty ratified by the Senate. Obama chose to circumvent the Constitution (as he had done so many times) and sign an agreement with Iran as an Executive Order. An EO is easily undone by the next President’s EO action. Thank you President Trump.

 

Below are a series of articles about President Donald Trump’s decision with a few titles that may be of interest.

 

JRH 5/9/18

Please Support NCCR

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

Promise Kept — Trump Nukes Iran Deal

Yet another pillar of Barack Obama’s horrible legacy crumbles at Trump’s hands.

 

By National Security Desk

May 9, 2018

The Patriot Post

 

Trump Caption: I Undid his (BHO) deal & Legacy. Patriot Post

 

Keeping his promise, President Donald Trump announced Tuesday that the United States will withdraw from the “horrible” Iran nuclear deal (the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action) and reinstate sanctions that were suspended as part of the deal. “We will not allow American cities to be threatened with destruction. We will not allow a regime that chants ‘Death to America’ to gain access to the most deadly weapons on earth,” Trump declared. “Today’s action sends a critical message: The United States no longer makes empty threats. When I make promises I keep them.”

 

Despite attempts by the Europeans to dissuade Trump, despite John Kerry’s smoke-filled-backroom efforts to save the deal, and despite Iran warning that it would be “a historic mistake” to withdraw, the president reiterated what he has said all along: “We cannot prevent an Iranian nuclear bomb under the decaying and rotten structure of the current agreement.” Trump reportedly remains open to improving the deal, and he will now have economic leverage to persuade Iran and the Europeans to do just that.

 

Barack Obama, who paid the Iranians $1.7 billion in ransom cash loaded on pallets as well as hundreds of billions more in sanctions relief, predictably criticized the decision to withdraw — which is tantamount to an endorsement in our book. “Walking away from the JCPOA turns our back on America’s closest allies,” Obama admonished, adding that it’s “a serious mistake.” But the biggest mistake was made by Obama and his feckless secretary of state, Kerry, caving in to one Iranian demand after another and agreeing to the deal. As we said at the time, “You want it bad, you’ll get it bad.”

 

Obama was so desperate for a foreign policy “victory” that getting a deal was more important than the content of the deal. Having agreed to a deal that he knew would never pass the Senate as a treaty, the minute the ink was dry Obama instead ran to the United Nations, which passed a Security Council Resolution establishing the deal’s terms. But only laws passed by the U.S. Congress, or treaties approved by the Senate, are binding on the actions of the United States. And as “constitutional scholar” Obama and long-time Senator Kerry undoubtedly knew, any deal that really was in the United States’ best interest would have been able to pass muster in the Senate and gain the two-thirds votes needed to ratify a treaty.

 

Obama and his various minions told us time after time that the deal would moderate Iran’s behavior and help bring it back into the community of nations, but a quick survey of recent events shows the spectacular deception of that claim.

 

Iran is fighting a proxy war in Syria to keep Bashar al-Assad’s murderous regime in power, and it probably has more troops on the ground than any group other than the Syrian Army. It continues flying military equipment into Syria via Iraq, attracting the occasional Israeli airstrike (including one just last night) and risking major escalation of the fighting there. Its proxies in Yemen have fired Iranian-made weapons at U.S. Navy ships in the Red Sea, as well as used one of Iran’s signature weapons, the explosive boat, to hit and severely damage a Saudi warship. Its ballistic missile activity has continued unabated, despite UN Security Council Resolution 2231’s prohibitions on such activity. In addition to missile testing, Iran has actually fired ballistic missiles at targets in Syria, and its Yemeni proxies have fired Iranian-made missiles into Saudi Arabia.

 

Needless to say, we don’t see much moderating in Iran’s behavior. Worse, Obama helped fund Iran’s increased terror sponsorship.

 

In the coming days and weeks we expect the various actors that supported the deal — Democrats, the Leftmedia, the Europeans, the Iranians — will all make the most of the opportunity to paint President Trump as a bumptious and warmongering rube. The Europeans will follow Obama’s cue and decry the undiplomatic behavior of withdrawing from a gentlemen’s agreement. The Iranians will shout about the untrustworthy nature of the United States. We even expect Rep. Maxine Waters will ascribe racism to President Trump’s decision, claiming it is an act of spite against his African-American predecessor.

 

But all the wailing and teeth-gnashing among various Europeans, Iranians, Democrats (and even some short-sighted Republicans) will merely serve to demonstrate the double injury Obama inflicted when he accepted the deal. The first injury was the deal itself. The second, as we said at the time, was that some future president would have to withdraw and harm our standing with friends and foes alike.

 

That day has now come, and our standing with our European allies may indeed suffer temporarily. Iran may try to create even more mischief around the Middle East. Oil markets and the U.S. and world economies may feel some pain as Iran’s oil market is squeezed.

 

But the undeniable fact is that the existing nuclear agreement merely kicked the can down the road for a decade, ensuring that Iran would emerge with a full, UN-approved nuclear fuel cycle that would enable very rapid nuclear breakout in the future. Dealing with this problem now, even if painful, is vastly better than dealing with it later, when it may not only be painful but also deadly. Withdrawing from the nuclear deal is a first step in the right direction.

 

On a final note, North Korea’s Kim Jong-un should take note that Trump isn’t messing around. Perhaps he already has, as Secretary of State Mike Pompeo returns home today from Pyongyang with three released American hostages.

++++++++++++++++++

Donald Trump Ends the Obama Mirage

The Iran nuclear deal, 2015-2018

 

By Matthew Continetti
May 8, 2018 3:03 pm

Washington Free Beacon

 

President Trump announced that the United States would withdraw from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), aka the Iran nuclear deal, on the afternoon of May 8. The deal, announced to such fanfare in July 2015, did not live to see its third birthday. And for that, I am grateful.

 

Why? Because the president said not only that America will be leaving the accord. He declared that the period of waxing Iranian influence in the Middle East is at an end. The deal financed several years of Iranian expansion through Shiite proxies in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, and Yemen. By reimposing sanctions, President Trump will weaken an already ailing Iranian economy. The Iranian currency, the rial, has plummeted in recent weeks. Inflation is rampant. The financial system is corrupted, dysfunctional. Strikes are proliferating, and often turn into displays against the government. This is a situation the United States should seek not to mitigate but to exacerbate.

 

Removing ourselves from the deal puts Iran on the defensive. Its people and government are divided and uncertain how to respond. Its leverage is minimal. Iranian citizens have seen their leaders use the money from the deal not to improve the economic lot of the average person but to fund the military, IRGC, and other instruments of foreign adventurism. Implicit in the deal was recognition of the Islamic regime as a legitimate member of the so-called “international community.” President Trump has rescinded that recognition and the standing that came with it. The issue is no longer Iranian compliance with an agreement that contained loopholes through which you could launch a Fateh-110 heavy missile. The issue is whether Iran chooses to become a responsible player or not, whether it curbs its imperial designs, cuts off its militias, abandons terrorism, opens its public square, and ceases its threats to and harassment of the United States and her allies. That choice is not Donald Trump’s to make. It is the Iranian regime’s.

 

Trump has made his choice. Like he did with the Supreme Court, the Paris Climate Accord, and the U.S. embassy in Jerusalem, Trump kept a promise made many times throughout the campaign. In truth, anyone who has listened to Trump over the last several years should not be surprised by his decision. From the beginning, he understood that any deal which gives the weaker party benefits up front in exchange for minimal temporary concessions is not a deal worth taking. And since he does not accept the worldview that inspired the deal, there is no reason for Trump to remain in it.

 

The worldview Trump opposes privileges therapy and dialogue over realism and hard decisions. It imagines that the Iranian theocracy is a reliable or trustworthy hedge against Sunni power and will liberalize gradually as the arc of justice progresses. These are the ideas that motivated the presidency of Barack Obama. The Iran deal was the signature achievement of Obama’s second term, and it is now gone. In truth, though, Obama’s legacy was disappearing long before Trump made his announcement. Obama’s legacy, like much of his self-presentation, was a mirage, a pleasing and attractive image that, upon closer inspection, loses coherence.

 

Because he governed so extensively through executive order and administrative fiat, because he was so contemptuous of criticism and had a “my way or the highway” approach to negotiations with Republicans (though not with Iranians), the longevity of Obama’s agenda depended heavily on his party winning a third consecutive term in the White House. As Tom Cotton warned the Iranians years ago, an agreement entered into by a president and not submitted to the Senate as a treaty can be abrogated by the next man who holds the office. Hillary Clinton’s failure doomed the Iran deal and the reputations it had established. It was Barack Obama and John Kerry who allowed Donald Trump to exit the deal by rejecting longstanding procedure. Perhaps it was knowledge of this fact that inspired Kerry in his desperate attempt to preserve the agreement.

 

Trump has spent much of his time in office reversing Obama policies that were made outside of, or in opposition to, America’s constitutional framework. He has had the hardest time repealing Obamacare, for the very reason that the Affordable Care Act was passed by the Congress and upheld by the Supreme Court. That is a lesson for any president: To have a long-lasting influence on American life, work within the system bequeathed to us by the Founders.

 

Because Republicans widely shared a negative attitude toward the Iran deal, many people assume that President Trump is doing what any other GOP president would do. But I am not sure. Another Republican president who had come up through the political system, or been enmeshed in the foreign policy establishment, or held elite opinion in esteem may well have given in to pressure to remain in the Paris accord, keep the U.S. embassy in Tel Aviv, and stay, at least partly, in the JCPOA. Trump’s outsider status and independence give him the freedom not only to flout political correctness but to repudiate the international and domestic consensus in ways his supporters love.

 

It took a small boy to say the emperor had no clothes. And it took Donald Trump to say that Barack Obama’s foreign policy legacy was a superficial and dangerous mirage.

 

Matthew Continetti is the Editor in Chief of the Washington Free Beacon. He can be reached at comments@freebeacon.com.

+++++++++++++++++++

Defying world, Trump says US withdrawing from Iran nuclear deal

Citing Israeli intelligence, president slams ‘defective’ pact, promises ‘highest level of economic sanction’ on Tehran

 

By ERIC CORTELLESSA

8 May 2018, 9:46 pm

Times of Israel

 

US President Donald Trump announces his decision on the Iran nuclear deal in the Diplomatic Reception Room at the White House in Washington, DC, on May 8, 2018. (AFP PHOTO / SAUL LOEB)

 

WASHINGTON — President Trump announced the US was withdrawing from the Iran nuclear deal on Tuesday, following through on a campaign promise and defying European allies who implored him to maintain an agreement that international agencies have said Tehran is honoring.

 

In a highly anticipated address from the White House’s Diplomatic Reception Room, Trump cast the landmark agreement forged under predecessor Barack Obama as “defective” and unable to rein in Iranian behavior or halt the Islamic Republic’s quest to develop nuclear weapons.

 

“I’m announcing today that the United States will withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal,” he said, adding that his administration “will be instituting the highest level of economic sanction.”

 

Trump said the 2015 agreement, which included Germany, France, Russia, China and Britain, was a “horrible one-sided deal that should never ever have been made.”

 

His remarks came ahead of his self-imposed May 12 deadline to walk away from the deal; that date is when the president would be required to renew waivers on sanctions against Iran’s nuclear program as required under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, as the deal is formally called.

 

Trump emphasized that sanctions would also apply to other nations that did business with Iran, meaning that the United States could very well apply sanctions on its closest European allies. “America will not be held hostage to nuclear blackmail,” Trump said.

 

However, officials said European companies would have several months to pull out of the Iranian market.

 

Trump said that his explosive move would signal “the United States no longer makes empty threats” on the world stage. “When I make promises, I keep them,” he said.

 

Responding to the move, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who has lobbied against the deal, said he offered his full support for Trump’s “bold move.”

 

In Iran, President Hassan Rouhani said Tehran would remain in the deal, but his country could resume nuclear activity if need be.

 

European signatories vowed to stick by the agreement.

 

In January, Trump waived sanctions for the third time in his presidency, but said he wouldn’t take that action again unless Congress and European allies amended the pact.

 

US President Donald Trump signs a document reinstating sanctions against Iran after announcing the US withdrawal from the Iran Nuclear deal, in the Diplomatic Reception Room at the White House in Washington, DC, on May 8, 2018. (AFP PHOTO / SAUL LOEB)

 

Since then, international negotiators have unsuccessfully sought to make changes to the deal — and Tehran has refused to accept any alterations to its terms.

 

One official briefed on the decision said Trump would move to reimpose all sanctions on Iran that had been lifted under the 2015 deal, not just the ones facing an immediate deadline.

 

As administration officials briefed congressional leaders about Trump’s plans Tuesday, they emphasized that just as with a major Asia trade deal and the Paris climate pact that Trump has abandoned, he remains open to renegotiating a better deal, one person briefed on the talks said.

 

The Iran agreement, struck in 2015 by the United States, other world powers, and Iran, lifted most US and international sanctions against the country. In return, Iran agreed to restrictions on its nuclear program making it impossible to produce a bomb, along with rigorous inspections.

 

Over the last several weeks, leaders from France, Britain, and Germany have all lobbied the president not to abscond from the accord, while Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu campaigned assiduously to discredit the deal.

 

Last week, he gave a PowerPoint presentation detailing a trove of documents the Mossad scooped that outline Iran’s covert attempts at developing a nuclear arsenal. Trump cited the trove and said the documents proved he was “100 percent right” in his skepticism and antipathy to the deal.

 

Trump has long cast the JCPOA as “worst deal ever negotiated” and a symbol of American weakness.

 

Trump signaled hours before his announcement an intention to undo the Obama administration’s signature foreign policy achievement.

 

Responding to recent reports that former secretary of state John Kerry recently met with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif to try and salvage the deal, Trump tweeted: “John Kerry can’t get over the fact that he had his chance and blew it! Stay away from negotiations John, you are hurting your country!”

 

Hours before the announcement, European countries met to underline their support for the agreement. Senior officials from Britain, France, and Germany met in Brussels with Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister for Political Affairs, Abbas Araghchi.

 

If the deal collapses, Iran would be free to resume prohibited enrichment activities, while businesses and banks doing business with Iran would have to scramble to extricate themselves or run afoul of the US American officials, who were dusting off plans for how to sell a pullout to the public and explain its complex financial ramifications.

 

In Iran, many were deeply concerned about how Trump’s decision could affect the already struggling economy.

 

In Tehran earlier Tuesday, President Hassan Rouhani sought to calm nerves, smiling as he appeared at a petroleum expo. He didn’t name Trump directly, but emphasized that Iran continued to seek “engagement with the world.”

 

“It is possible that we will face some problems for two or three months, but we will pass through this,” Rouhani said.

 

From left, US Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz, US Secretary of State John Kerry, and US Under Secretary for Political Affairs Wendy Sherman meet with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, second from right, at a hotel in Vienna, Austria, Saturday, June 27, 2015. (Carlos Barria/Pool via AP)

 

Members of the Obama administration who helped solidify the international agreement told reporters before Trump’s announcement that the consequences of blowing up the deal could be cataclysmic.

 

“Iran could start on its way back to getting a nuclear weapon,” said Wendy Sherman, a former State Department official in the Obama administration who was the chief US negotiator of the agreement. “It raises risk of conflict in the Middle East. It could potentially put our forces at risk everywhere. It also puts Americans being held in Iran more at risk. It will weaken our alliances with Europe, and for that matter Russia and China, who are important to the North Korea negotiation. This is a crisis that Trump is precipitating himself.”

 

In his speech, Trump said “a constructive deal could easily been struck at the time, but it wasn’t.” The ensuing deal was “a great embarrassment to me as a citizen and all citizens of the United States.”

 

As he has in the past, he cast the deal’s sunset provisions, which allow certain restrictions on Tehran’s nuclear program to expire over time, as unacceptable. He said Tuesday, however, that they led Iran to “the nuclear brink” and that, “If I allowed this deal to stand, there would soon be a nuclear arms race in the Middle East.”

 

He further portrayed the accord as one that would lead to Iran crossing the nuclear threshold, not one that would prevent that.

 

“It is clear to me that we cannot prevent an Iranian nuclear bomb under the decaying and rotten structure of the current agreement,” he said. “The Iran deal is defective at its core. If we do nothing, we know exactly what will happen.”

 

He also said that Iran would ultimately want to re-negotate another deal that fully meets Trump’s demands — something Iran itself has said it would not do. “The fact is they are going to want to make a new and lasting deal,” Trump said.

 

Anthony Blinken, a former deputy secretary of state in the Obama administration, warned this move will give hardliners in Iran an excuse to restart their pursuit of nuclear weapons, but without a united international coalition to oppose them, or inspectors on the ground to expose them.” He said that meant, “we would get to the point where we would have to live with an Iranian nuclear weapon or get into a conflict.”

 

He also surmised that if Iran and Europe decide to stick with the deal, despite Trump’s refusal to renew the sanction waivers, that will “at some point force the administration to sanction our closest allies to stop them from doing business with Iran.”

 

“So we’re on a collision course in two directions,” he added.

 

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

+++++++++++++++++++

Posts of possible interest:

 

 

 

__________________________

Trump Nixes Iran Nuke Deal

John R. Houk, Blog Editor

© May 9, 2018

__________________________

Promise Kept — Trump Nukes Iran Deal

 

Copyright © 2018 The Patriot Post.

 

Support The Patriot Post

_______________

Donald Trump Ends the Obama Mirage

 

©2018 All Rights Reserved 

 

About Washington Free Beacon

______________________

Defying world, Trump says US withdrawing from Iran nuclear deal

 

The Times of Israel homepage

 

Dear Zohreh


My Internet Jewish friend Ari Bussel writes about Iranian expatriates living in the USA demonstrating in support of the brave souls protesting the Mullah regime in Iran.

You might find it interesting a pro-Israel Jew is standing with Iranians in America protesting against the Islamic Republic of Iran’s repressive regime. After all it is Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and his predecessor Khomeini, call Israel little Satan and America Great Satan.

 

The Iranians living America are protesting the Mullahs as exiles that fled Iran after the fall of the monarchy of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. These protesting Iranian had become used to the Shah’s modernization and did not desire to live in an Iran thrust back into the medieval days of a Shia Islam in totalitarianism was the rule of law.

 

In full disclosure the Shah was no modern saint. The Shah had a secret police organization called SAVAK that was quite brutal toward the Shias that resisted Iranian modernization. The Mullocracy secret police (or whatever they are called) make SAVAK look like kindergarten bullies controlling the school yard.

 

According to historian Ervand Abrahamian, “Whereas less than 100 political prisoners had been executed between 1971 and 1979, more than 7,900 were executed between 1981 and 1985. . . . Prison life was drastically worse under the Islamic Republic than under the Pahlavis. One who survived both writes that four months under [the ayatollahs’ warden] took the toll of four years under SAVAK. In the prison literature of the Pahlavi era, the recurring words have been ‘boredom’ and ‘monotony.’ In that of the Islamic Republic, they are ‘fear,’ ‘death,’ ‘terror,’ ‘horror,’ and most frequent of all ‘nightmare.’” READ ENTIRETY (Iran: The Truth about the CIA and the Shah; By JOSH GELERNTER; National Review; 7/24/15 3:34 PM)

 

JRH 1/9/18

Please Support NCCR

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

Dear Zohreh

Iran Demonstration – Los Angeles, Sunday, January 7, 2018

 

By Ari Bussel

Sent 1/7/2018 8:10 PM

 

Totally immersed 

 

A lot of work went into it.  For the ten days preceding the demonstration, all I heard from you was “flags,” “posters,” “coordination,” “permit,” “notices” and “press outreach.”  So many details, so much effort beyond the technical aspects.

 

The situation in Iran so occupied your mind and being, that there was no time left for anything else, and yet, on Shabbat you were at Shul (our synagogue) and after Shabbat you went to visit the sick.

 

Even then, you could not resist, walking from Century City to Beverly Hills with the Iranian flag; a solitary march, in preparation for today.

 

Futility?

 

I discounted the entire affair; for what good would it do?  For the young Iranians in Iran are well educated, with relatively good access to the West (a mutual acquaintance of ours raised and spent tens of millions of dollars of the American tax payer money to ensure exactly that).  They were all born into the regime of the Islamic Republic of Iran.  They know nothing different, would not remember with great admiration the late Shah, the same way I do, and if Iran is pushed or attacked, their loyalty will be with Iran; only with Iran.

 

Are they dreaming of an “Iranian Spring?”  To what end?  Replacing the Mullahs with a dictator of a different persuasion?  Allow me to remind us all – this happened once before, in 1978-1979, when Ayatollah Khomeini took over following President Carter’s pressure on the Shah of Iran.

 

Today’s kids, youth and young Iranians know nothing better or different, and their aspirations will be quashed most harshly, in a similar manner to the way the Green Revolution ended, about some nine years ago, or to the manner in which some one million Syrians have received the blow from the current regime – murder, rape, torture, imprisonment.

 

And yet, it is good to dream; even when it is evident the support of Hizbollah, Hamas and global terrorism will not lessen; on the contrary, it will only intensify.

Iranians Against Terrorist Islamic Regime

 

PST (Persian Standard Time)

 

Sunday, 1PM in front of the Federal Building in Los Angeles.  You intended to arrive half an hour early, to bring the flags you bought and the signs you printed.  You and I have often arrived early to events, at times being the first to arrive.  Not today.

 

In front of the Federal Building in Los Angeles

 

When I arrived at 12:30, there were already a few hundred demonstrators, with flags and signs (one in particular caught my eye: “Make Iran Great Again”).  Alas, “Persian Standard Time” happened in the reverse today.  For the next three hours, there will be a non-stop stream of people, adding up to some 2,500 strong.

 

The Absent Youth

 

Noticeably absent?  Children and youth.  There was one infant, two kids, another youth and later a handful of others.  Not even 1% of the attendees.

 

What was visible are the real Iranians; those who had to flee and can only dream of going back.  They came dressed immaculately, some with walkers, others with canes, still others on wheelchairs or being supported by a spouse.  They carried on with dignity and a sense of purpose.  Their children, themselves parents now, came in droves.  They remember Iran of the Shah, and they grew up on their parents’ upbringing, where Iran was the essence of life.  But their kids, those “30 year after,” did not bother to show up.

 

People Have Spoken: Iran– No Fascist Theocracy – YES Secular Democracy

 

(Iran) was vandalized and later the Jews targeted.  That ended 2017, and 2018 began with protests that spread throughout Iran, then were harshly quashed, as expected.

 

But those in their 30s, those already born here, stayed at home.  It is Sunday after all, and there are more important things to do on such a beautiful day.

 

For them, Iran is part of their cultural heritage, but definitely not the meaning of life.  They are similar to young American Jews who see themselves as Americans first, and if Israel ceases to exist, the world for them will not come to an end.

 

And herein lies the real danger.  Young Iranians in Iran are very focused and loyal, no matter how “difficult” the present may seem.  Their counterparts who were born and raised in the USA have no focus, no loyalty (other than to themselves) and no obligation (such as military or national service).  It is a generation completely self-centered, void of any obligations and absorbed in a strange world of social-networks “friends” and “likes,” “petitions” and “action,” and an overall attention span of seconds.

 

The Stranger in Your Midst

 

Having worked closely with the Iranian community over the past year, it was obvious I should be there.  Unlike other non-Iranians, I actually lived in Iran of the Shah, and to this day I speak most highly about the Shah’s concern and action for his people and his ancient kingdom, as he tried to bring it fast-forward into modernity.

 

Iran Flag under Shah

 

I was surprised to be greeted time and again: “Ari, what are you doing here?”

 

Well, it is a most familiar place for me, for on the side stretch the rows of dead, those who fought for all the freedoms we enjoy.

 

And here, exactly on the four corners of Wilshire Blvd and Veteran Ave, just a short distance away from my alma mater UCLA campus, I stood numerous times, defending Israel against external and internal enemies.

 

I am used to police, but not so many like today.  Veteran Ave. was shut down on both sides, and the police, most patiently, stayed away, allowing the expanding crowd to swell, grow, move outward.

 

Down with Islamic Republic of Iran

 

Overall, it was touchy, fulfilling and sad to see a people exiled from their land, gathered together in a futile plea for change.  Hope and Change, neither of which can materialize.  Not in Iran; not in N. Korea – both posing grave threats to world peace, to the world as we know it today.

 

Support of Passersby Cars

 

We stood next to the heart of Teheran-geles (combination of Teheran and Los Angeles), Westwood, so one would expect that some of the passing cars would be of Iranian Americans.  But the nonstop honking confused me.  Are so many supporting the demonstration?  Most Americans would not even know to recognize the flag of Iran, or to differentiate between the flag of the monarchy and that of the Islamic Republic.

 

These are the same Americans that would spit toward the Flag of Israel and crush or burn the American Flag, while stay oblivious to the flag of Daesh (Isis/Isil as President Obama liked to refer to the Islamic Caliphate).

 

So why are they honking?  And to what end?  I soon figured it out.  It is in this very intersection that regular demonstrations against Israel take place, under the banner “Free Palestine.”  The colors are similar (green, white, red for Iran, same with black for so-called Palestine).  People surely thought they were honking against the Jews, against Israel, wishing to “End the Occupation” and “Free, Free Palestine from the River to the Sea!”

 

The March of 2,500 Strong

 

The singing, chanting and calls over the loudspeakers were familiar: “Regime change in Iran.”  “Human rights for Iran.”  “Long Live ….”  “Freedom for Iran; no more Ayatollah!”  And a sea of flags and posters.  The swelling crowd, growing by the minute, getting ready for the march.

 

Regime Change for Iran

 

A permit was issued to march on Wilshire Blvd (closing east bound traffic lanes) to Westwood Blvd, turn onto Westwood (where the south bound lanes were closed) and continue south to Ohio.  The march, like the gathering beforehand, was very well organized, a mid-Sunday outing.  People hugged and kissed; took picture, waved flags, carried signs, sang and chanted.  In short, they enjoyed the freedoms afforded to every American, those that are not tolerated in Iran or in Arab countries throughout the Middle East.  And they were safe.

 

The group, a block and a half long and 15 – 20 deep, marched onward, carrying their dream – a memory 40 years old and beyond – with them.

 

I was inspired, full of respect and sorrow, sadness that you are celebrating a world that will not return, to which you are not allowed to return.

 

But you must not stop.  And do not be discouraged.

 

We have seen that Israel, constantly warning of the grave danger from Iran, has stopped its radio broadcasting in Farsi (something to do with lack of budget, more likely indicating lack of importance assigned to it); its President just weeks ago during an official, rare visit did not find the time to meet with the Iranian community in Los Angeles or its leadership.  Actions talk louder than words, and Israel apparently is focused on action of a different type (something similar to Stuxnet maybe).

 

We have seen American Jewry “help defeat the opposition to the Iran deal,” and AIPAC, the Israel lobby waste tens of millions of dollars failing to stop it.  The result was the same – a deal for which a second Nobel Prize was forthcoming to President Obama, for using diplomacy to achieve “Peace in our Lifetime!”

 

And here, today, some 2,500 Iranians (with one exception) who realize the danger, understand that Iranians are not Arabs, that most are very educated and determined, loyal and clear in their look, and whose time horizon is different than that of Western Civilization came out to demonstrate.  I stood amidst you and I was smiling, proud, grateful.

 

 Photos of Mullocracy Abuses

 

And as you chanted “Regime Change in Iran,” I felt safe enough to stand there amongst you – the only non-Persian – and sing “Yerushalaim, Yerushalaim….”

 

Always,

Ari Bussel

bussel@me.com
__________________

Edited by John R. Houk

 

© Ari Bussel