Ayatollah Ali Khamenei - Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association

Amid protests, Khamenei digs in, vows Iran won’t ‘back down’ to ‘vandals and saboteurs’

Times of Israel — Fri, 09 Jan 2026 21:47:35 +0000

Islamic Republic’s supreme leader says Trump, who’s threatened to hit Iran if demonstrators are killed, has hands ‘stained with the blood of Iranians’ and will be ‘overthrown’

Iran’s supreme leader signaled Friday that security forces would crack down on protesters after they screamed from windows and marched through the streets overnight, directly challenging US President Donald Trump’s pledge to support those peacefully demonstrating.

Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei dismissed Trump as having hands “stained with the blood of Iranians” as supporters shouted “Death to America!” in footage aired by Iranian state television.

Protesters are “ruining their own streets to make the president of another country happy,” Khamenei said, referring to Trump. There was no immediate response from Washington, though Trump reiterated his pledge to strike Iran if protesters are killed.

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Source: https://www.timesofisrael.com/amid-protests-khamenei-digs-in-vows-iran-wont-back-down-to-vandals-and-saboteurs/?fbclid=IwY2xjawPONjxleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZBAyMjIwMzkxNzg4MjAwODkyAAEeT3b8HJDWDbdiZXEO923dCj2FEhqTG5qhdaVfPXu0y_NUZqU1t3k6_w4V_Ds_aem__42gJcw2_uq4KrgMv5_6LA

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Iran’s supreme leader rejects ‘arrogant’ US nuclear deal proposal

Emily Crane and Caitlin Doornbos | New York Post — Thu, 05 Jun 2025 17:51:39 +0000

Iran’s supreme leader on Wednesday blasted the US as “arrogant” as he effectively rejected a revised nuclear deal that would allow Tehran to continue low-level uranium enrichment.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei argued that abandoning uranium enrichment was “100%” against the country’s interests and “can do spirit” — as he ripped a central US demand amid talks to resolve a decades-long dispute over Tehran’s nuclear ambitions.

“The proposal that the Americans have presented is 100% against our interests … The rude and arrogant leaders of America repeatedly demand that we should not have a nuclear program. Who are you to decide whether Iran should have enrichment?” he said in a televised speech.

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Source: https://nypost.com/2025/06/04/world-news/irans-supreme-leader-rejects-us-nuclear-deal-proposal/

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U.S. and Allies Close to Reviving Nuclear Deal With Iran, Officials Say

Today News Network — Mon, 31 Jan 2022 17:19:45 +0000

WASHINGTON — The United States and its European allies appear on the cusp of restoring the deal that limited Iran’s nuclear program, Biden administration officials said on Monday, but cautioned that it is now up to the new government in Tehran to decide whether, after months of negotiations, it is willing to dismantle much of its nuclear production equipment in return for sanctions relief.

Speaking to reporters in Washington, a senior State Department official signaled that negotiators were prepared to accept the broad outlines of an agreement after discussions last week in Vienna. It would essentially return to the 2015 deal that President Donald J. Trump discarded four years ago, over the objections of many of his key advisers. Ultimately, that freed Iran to resume its nuclear production, in some cases enriching nuclear fuel to levels far closer to what is needed to make nuclear weapons.

Administration officials cautioned that it was not clear whether a final agreement would be struck, and in Iran that decision is bound to go to the supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. But the State Department official said that “we can see a path to a deal if those decisions are made and if they are made quickly.”

“Now is the time for Iran to decide whether it’s prepared to make those decisions,” the official said. A second senior administration official also said the talks had reached the decision-making stage. Both officials spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the negotiations.

For President Biden, restoring the deal — and with it, limits on Iran’s production capability — would fulfill a major campaign promise and seal a breach Mr. Trump created with Britain, France, Germany and the European Union, which participated in the original agreement along with Russia and China. But it also comes with significant political risks.

No Republican voted for the deal in 2015, and its restoration would almost certainly become a campaign issue in the midterm elections. Like the original deal, the new one would not limit Iran’s missile development, the senior official said. It also would not halt Tehran’s support for terrorist groups or its proxy forces, which have stirred unrest across the Middle East, as some Democrats and nearly all Republicans have demanded.

Despite those shortcomings, Mr. Biden is prepared to return to the 2015 agreement and “to make the political decisions necessary to achieve that goal,” the senior State Department official said.

And while American officials offered no details, a clean restoration of the old accord would mean all limits on Iran’s production of nuclear material would still expire in 2030. Last year, Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken vowed that after restoring the old accord, the United States would seek one that was “longer and stronger.” But Iranian officials rejected that idea.

The State Department official said that the negotiations to restore the 2015 agreement were “in a final stretch” and that “all sides” needed to commit to returning to full compliance. In fact, the United States violated the original accord first, when it withdrew and reimposed sanctions against Iran. Mr. Trump then added hundreds of additional sanctions, and it is unclear how the negotiation now underway would deal with those.

In Iran, Ali Akbar Salehi, the former head of the country’s Atomic Energy Organization and a key player in the original negotiations, told an energy conference that “it appears that the nuclear negotiations will reach the end result that we have in mind,’’ according to Iranian news reports.

After nearly two years of trying to persuade European leaders to counter the American sanctions, Iran began violating the agreement, denying inspectors access to key facilities and ramping up its nuclear enrichment.

While it has not amassed the same volume of enriched uranium as it held before the 2015 agreement, it has purified some of its new stockpile to a level of 60 percent — closer to the 90 percent enrichment used to produce nuclear weapons. Previously, Iran had capped its enrichment at 20 percent.

“A country enriching at 60 percent is a very serious thing,” Rafael Grossi, the director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations body that inspects Iran’s production facilities and verifies compliance with agreements. “Only countries making bombs are reaching this level.”

Iran had been resistant to eliminating that 60 percent-enriched fuel. It is unclear how it would be disposed of, or whether it would just be moved to another country, perhaps Russia, which took Iran’s previous stockpile.

When Mr. Trump exited the original agreement in 2018 — which he called “the worst deal ever” — he promised to force Tehran into new negotiations, saying he would get better terms and also halt the country’s support for the Syrian regime, its funding of terrorist groups and its missile tests. But he never got them back to the negotiating table.

Instead, Iran doubled down on its nuclear and military activities in the region, and evaded sanctions by smuggling oil to key buyers — including China — to keep its economy afloat as it waited for the Trump administration to leave office.

The new government of President Ebrahim Raisi was dismissive of its predecessors, charging that they had failed to get sanctions lifted even after Iran shipped 97 percent of its nuclear fuel out of the country. And for months it left American negotiators — whom it has refused to meet directly — dangling, uncertain whether the new leadership would even attempt to reconstitute the old arrangement. Over time, though, economic pressures on Iran built.

Still, returning to the accord is sure to anger hard-liners in Iran who have warned that the United States could renege again when Mr. Biden is no longer president. They sought a written assurance that the United States would never leave the arrangement, something Mr. Biden said he could not provide.

Mr. Biden’s biggest political vulnerability now may be that in restoring the old arrangement, he buys an eight-year reprieve at best.

“You arrest the advance of the of the program; you buy time to deal with what is a problem that is being deferred,” said Dennis B. Ross, a longtime Middle East negotiator who oversaw Iran policy at the White House during the Obama administration. “It’s not going away — it’s being deferred.”

However, Mr. Ross said, the deal helps stave off a nuclear arms race in the region.

One key issue is how Israel will respond. It has continued its sabotage campaign against Iran’s facilities, blowing up some of them and, at the end of the Trump administration, assassinating the scientist who led what American and Israeli intelligence believe was Iran’s bomb-design project. But no intelligence agency has provided public evidence that the project has resumed in a significant way since it was suspended in 2003.

On Monday, ardent critics of the 2015 deal — and by extension the return to it — vowed to overturn it when a Republican president returns to the White House.

“Any nuclear deal will allow Iran to take patient pathways to nuclear weapons as key restrictions expire and tens of billions of dollars flow into the coffers of the regime to finance its destructive activities,” said Mark Dubowitz, the chief executive of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington think tank, who worked with several administrations on Iran policy.

“When power shifts in Washington, Republicans again will reimpose all the sanctions and take America out of what they see as a fatally flawed agreement,” he said.

Source: https://todaynewsnetwork.in/u-s-and-allies-close-to-reviving-nuclear-deal-with-iran-officials-say/

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Congressional Republicans vow to block US sanctions relief for Iran

Joyce Karam — Tue, 30 Nov 2021 02:48:30 +0000

Letter signed by 25 Republican representatives on Monday accuses Biden administration of withholding information on Iran

A group of 25 Republican members of Congress wrote a letter to US President Joe Biden this week pledging to block any sanctions relief for Iran, as negotiators meet in Vienna to try to reach an agreement on the nuclear deal.

The letter, obtained by The National, accuses the White House of withholding information from Congress and ignoring requests to provide details about the nature of negotiations with Tehran.

“Despite over a dozen letters by members of the Republican Study Committee asking for information on Iran sanctions enforcement, your administration has continued to leave Congress in the dark regarding its plans to weaken sanctions enforcement and provide sanctions relief to Iran,” the letter read.

The committee has more than 150 Republican members and advocates for conservative policies on defence and foreign policy issues.

In the letter, the signatories re-assert the power of Congress to impose sanctions on Iran.

“We are writing to remind you that the power to regulate commerce with foreign nations and hence the ability to enact economic sanctions resides in Congress,” it said.

The Biden administration entered indirect negotiations with Iran this week in Vienna, with talks centred on Tehran’s demands for sanctions relief.

Russia’s representative to the talks, Mikhail Ulyanov, tweeted on Tuesday that progress has been made on “sanctions lifting and nuclear issues”.

Mikhail Ulyanov@Amb_Ulyanov
The resumption of the #ViennaTalks is quite successful. At the very beginning of the seventh round #JCPOA participants decided to continue without delay the drafting process in two working groups- on sanctions lifting and nuclear issues. This work starts immediately.

Asked if the Biden administration was willing to lift sanctions on Iran, State Department deputy spokeswoman Jalina Porter said on Monday that the goal is compliance.

“I won’t get into the details or any hypotheticals from here, but I’ll just focus on the goal, which is a mutual return to compliance … that’s in America’s national interest and we believe it’s the best available option to restrict Iran’s nuclear programme and also provide a platform to address Iran’s destabilising conduct,” Ms Porter explained.

“If Iran demands more or offers less than a mutual return to compliance, these negotiations will not succeed.”

But the Republican signatories to the letter, first reported on by The Free Beacon, are threatening to block any relief if they win a majority in the House in next year’s midterm elections.

“When Republicans return to the majority soon, we look forward to re-asserting Congress’s authority over economic sanctions by passing the Maximum Pressure Act and circumscribing the ability of your administration, like the Obama administration before it, to lift sanctions and abuse waiver and license authorities to provide sanctions relief to Iran,” the letter said, referencing Trump-era legislation that codified the sanctions regime aimed at stopping Iran from obtaining a nuclear weapon.

In the Senate, legislation to prevent the US from rejoining the nuclear deal was introduced in February and has gained the support of high-ranking senators such as Jim Risch, Marco Rubio, Susan Collins, Ted Cruz, Tim Scott and others.

It stipulates that the lifting of sanctions imposed on Iran cannot take place without addressing the full scope of Iran’s malign activities, which include “its nuclear programme, ballistic and cruise missile capabilities, weapons proliferation, support for terrorism, hostage-taking, gross human rights violations and other destabilising activities”.

For the Biden administration to lift some of the sanctions imposed under Donald Trump — such as those placed on Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, and Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi — it would need congressional review.

Such a move would allow Republicans to force a vote on killing the agreement in Congress.

The Israeli government, which opposes a return to the nuclear deal, has warned the Biden administration that Iran is preparing to enrich weapons-grade uranium, Axios reported on Monday.

Israeli Defence Minister Benny Gantz is expected to visit Washington this week.

Source: https://www.thenationalnews.com/world/us-news/2021/11/30/congressional-republicans-vow-to-block-us-sanctions-relief-for-iran/

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Israeli PM Naftali Bennett warns US to ‘wake up’ before rejoining Iran nuclear deal

Mark Moore | New York Post — Mon, 21 Jun 2021 12:28:07 +0000

Bennett said Ebrahim Raisi, a protege of Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, would establish a “regime of brutal hangmen”

Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett warned the U.S. and other nations seeking to rekindle the nuclear agreement with Iran to “wake up” following the election of a hardline judge as the country’s president.

Speaking at a televised cabinet meeting in Jerusalem, Bennett said Ebrahim Raisi, a protege of Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, would establish a “regime of brutal hangmen,” Reuters reported.

NETANYAHU GOES ‘SCORCHED EARTH’ DURING EXIT

“Raisi’s election is, I would say, the last chance for world powers to wake up before returning to the nuclear agreement, and understand who they are doing business with,” said Bennett, who replaced Benjamin Netanyahu last week after the former prime minister failed to form a new government.

“A regime of brutal hangmen must never be allowed to have weapons of mass destruction,” Bennett said. “Israel’s position will not change on this.”

Raisi, Iran’s chief jurist who is under U.S. sanctions for human rights violations, pulled in 62 percent of the vote in Saturday’s election that was marked by extremely low turnout — less than half the country’s eligible voters cast a ballot.

Bennett has carried on with Netanyahu’s view that the U.S. should not rejoin the nuclear agreement that former President Donald Trump withdrew from in 2018.

The Biden administration has said it wanted to restart negotiations with Iran about returning to the deal the Obama administration brokered with world powers in 2015.

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It has begun talks with the countries still participating in the accord — Britain, China, France, Russia, and Germany.

To read more from the New York Post, click here.

Source: https://www.foxnews.com/world/israeli-pm-naftali-bennett-warns-us-to-wake-up-before-rejoining-iran-nuclear-deal

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Iran knows ‘how to drive a truck through American weakness,’ Mike Pompeo tells Arab News

Arab News — Thu, 25 Mar 2021 06:08:52 +0000

Former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo spoke, in an exclusive interview with Arab News, about the sustained threat the Iranian regime poses. (AN Photo/Screenshot)

Former secretary of state says protecting US soldiers in Middle East requires strong response to Iran’s actions
Says to deny Saudis “capacity to defend themselves is just crazy” and blames Houthis for blocking aid in Yemen

RIYADH: The US administration has a responsibility to push back against efforts to undermine Saudi Arabia, former US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo says in an exclusive interview with Arab News, adding that to deny the Saudis “the capacity to defend themselves is just crazy, and yet that appears to be the direction this administration is taking.”

He says “the Iranian leadership understands how to drive a truck through American weakness” and that deterring the regime will require “a consistent, sound message” and “a willingness to impose a cost.”

Pompeo has also voiced strong opposition to the Biden administration’s lifting of the Yemeni Houthi militia’s terrorist designation, pointing out that “no one disputes that the Houthis are terrorists and no one disputes that the Iranians are underwriting them.”

In the interview, he touched on a number of important issues including the spike in attacks on Saudi population centers and oil infrastructure, Iranian perceptions of the Biden administration’s foreign-policy moves, the Houthis’ role in exacerbating the humanitarian crisis in Yemen, and the Trump administration’s handling of US-Saudi relations.

“In the end, the Iranian leadership, the (Supreme Leader) Ayatollah (Ali Khamenei) and all those around him understand one thing: They understand power. And when they take action and they see weakness or they see appeasement or they have an expectation that there will be appeasement, they’re going to continue to act out,” Pompeo said.

Sounding a blunt warning, he said: “So, whether it’s the effort that you have seen from the missile strikes that (the Iranians) have undertaken, or the efforts they have taken to continue to put pressure on the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to deny what we all know, their clandestine program, clandestine sites where they had WMDs that weren’t declared — those are the kind of things we will continue to see until the world, not just the United States, but the whole world, the E3 (UK, France, Germany) included, says that ‘That’s enough, we’re not going to allow this to happen anymore.’”

Pompeo was a congressman from Kansas who later served as CIA director under President Donald Trump before being nominated and confirmed as secretary of state in 2018. On his watch, the US adopted a campaign of “maximum pressure” to isolate the Iranian regime and kept open the option of a military strike to “keep Americans” safe.

Since leaving office in January, Pompeo has hit the speaking circuit and refused to rule out a potential 2024 presidential bid if his former boss, Trump, does not run. In addition to saying that he wants to help Republicans and advocate for conservatives, Pompeo has scolded the new US administration for refusing to put America first, especially in the context of the Middle East.

Pompeo told Arab News what makes him concerned is not just the “signals that the (Biden) administration sends; it’s the policy direction that they have indicated they intend to go.”

“They have made very clear that they would prefer to re-enter some kind of negotiation that’s closely tied to the 2015 JCPOA,” he said, referring to the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, commonly known as the Iran nuclear deal.

The deal was reached in July 2015 between Iran and the P5+1 (the five Permanent Members of the UN Security Council plus Germany) together with the European Union. The Trump administration withdrew the US from the JCPOA in May 2018, citing the flaws of its temporary nature, its lack of controls on Iran’s ballistic missile program and Iran’s “malign behavior” in Syria and elsewhere in the Middle East.

“Let’s go look at the actions. So far, the administration has de-designated a terrorist organization. No one disputes, no one disputes that the Houthis are terrorists. And no one disputes that the Iranians are underwriting them,” Pompeo said.

“This administration said: ‘We’re going to take them off the list.’ This administration worked alongside the IAEA to say ‘No, were not going to issue a report about this material that was at undeclared locations.’

“They now are going to allow money from the IMF and from the Republic of Korea to flow into Iranian coffers. These are the kinds of concessions, before there’s been any conversation about actually even entering into a negotiation. This connotes weakness and, I promise you, the Iranian leadership understands how to drive a truck through American weakness.”

Describing Saudi Arabia as “an important security partner” for the US, Pompeo said: “For an awfully long time, I think we neglected this (fact). When we get this right, we can put fewer of our young men and women, American young men and women, overseas in the Middle East facing risk, and we can support them.”

Elaborating on how this could be achieved, he said: “It always begins with a commitment, a diplomatic commitment, a commitment from the president of the United States, that says we understand that you in Saudi Arabia have the right to defend yourself when there are missiles being launched into your country. To deny them the capacity to defend themselves is just crazy, and yet that appears to be the direction this administration is taking.

“Second, we worked with the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia on a broader range of issues, weapons sales, things that would provide security for the people of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.”

Pompeo rejected the common critique that the Trump administration ignored human rights in the process. “Nothing could be further from the truth,” he said. “We supported the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia as it began to open up inside, to allow women to be more active and to do many things which had been prohibited for an awfully long time. And real progress was made.”

He argued that the Trump administration did call out the Kingdom when mistakes occurred. And in the case of the killing of Jamal Khashoggi, the administration did sanction the operatives who were implicated.

At the time, the Kingdom admitted that a number of agents had exceeded their authority and ended up killing the journalist in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul, Turkey, in 2018. A trial followed and five Saudis were sentenced to death with another three given jail time over the killing.

Still, Pompeo reiterated that having a “deep security relationship with the Kingdom is central to American security and also to security throughout the Middle East.”

He drew a sharp contrast between Trump’s Middle East policy and that of his successor.

“We had three primary lines of effort. The first was to build a coalition against the largest state sponsor of terror in the world, the Iranian regime. And we did that,” he said.

“We built a coalition that included Arabs and Israelis. It included others too who were prepared to help us patrol the Straits of Hormuz. We built a real global coalition against Iran to deter military attack.

“Second, we put enormous economic pressure on the Iranian regime. We sanctioned them; we made sure that they couldn’t sell their crude oil around the world — all the things that would force the Iranian regime to make hard decisions about how to spend resources.

“If you want to underwrite Hezbollah, you have to have less money to feed and care for your people. If you want to support the Iraqi militias, if you want to help the Assad regime in Syria, we made them face difficult financial constraints with the hope that they would ultimately conclude that building out their nuclear program, and continuing to build their missile program, wasn’t in their country’s best interests.”

Pompeo continued: “The third thing we did is we supported the Iranian people. This is different to what the Obama administration did. We were very mindful that the Iranian people themselves want a life that is not terribly different than that people all around the world want — and that the theocrats, the kleptocrats in power in Iran today, (may) have the weapon systems but not the hearts and minds of the Iranian people.

“So, we did everything we could to support the Iranian people. Those three key pillars of our policy were the right direction. They were the thing that would create the best deterrent from Iran attacking Arab countries, provided the most assurance that the Iranian stated intent to wipe Israel off the face of the map, would not come to fruition.”

Pompeo says there is no reason to second-guess the Iranian regime’s mindset. “They’ve made it very clear they are prepared to do things all around the world, with what they see as securing their rights around the world,” he told Arab News.

“So, I talked about this when I was secretary of state a great deal, (about) their efforts to conduct assassination campaigns all across Europe.

“You’ve seen some of their actors arrested and imprisoned in Europe, after they’ve been caught. It always befuddled me to watch the E3 continue to cozy up to the Iranians and the JCPOA deal to say ‘No, this is the right direction,’ when in fact the Iranians were trying to kill people inside each of their countries.

“We certainly see that here in the United States too. We shouldn’t forget it wasn’t all that long ago that the Iranians had a plot to kill the Saudi ambassador right here, not very far from where I’m sitting here today in Washington D.C.

“They’ve a global campaign, a global espionage campaign, a global assassination effort, all in defense of a handful of senior leaders inside of Iran who are siphoning off the remaining funds available to the Iranians. We can’t continue to underwrite this.

“We can’t relieve these sanctions, until Iran releases all the American prisoners, until Iran comes to understand that it is unacceptable to engage in this kind of behavior. To reward that, to reward them with financial resources, only gives them an incentive to continue to do this and provides them with the capital to continue these programs.”

Moving on to his decision to designate the Houthis a “foreign terrorist organization,” Pompeo told Arab News: “Of course. It was a simple step that was made by the (Trump) administration. It was straightforward. It didn’t take any great heavy lifting.

“But, look, the (Biden) administration can’t deny that these are terrorists, yet (it has) now said (the Houthis) are not terrorists. I understand the concerns that the world has about the humanitarian challenges inside of Yemen. Indeed, the Trump administration spent a great deal of American taxpayers’ money — and we convinced the Saudis and the Emiratis to do the same — to make sure that ordinary people in Yemen didn’t suffer famine.

“We worked really hard on this. We made sure, the best we could, that food got into that country. But the people who were preventing global aid from reaching those who actually needed that food and that medicine were, in fact, the Houthis.”

Alluding to President Joe Biden’s decision to drop the militia’s “terrorist” label, he said: “The Houthis have now demonstrated that if you continue to block routes of transit, if you continue to threaten ports, if you continue to take real estate, as they’re trying to do in Marib today, if they continue down that path, they’ll be rewarded with sanctions relief. That’s the wrong direction. They understand power. We’ve now demonstrated that we’re prepared to give them something when, in fact, they gave up nothing.”

Last week, Brent crude futures jumped above $70 for the first time in more than a year after Saudi oil facilities were targeted by missiles and drones. A petroleum tank farm at one of the world’s largest oil shipping ports was attacked by a drone while a ballistic missile targeted Saudi Aramco facilities, according to state news agency SPA. Shrapnel from the intercepted missile fell near residential areas in the city of Dhahran.

“You’ll recall that when the Saudi Aramco facility was targeted during our administration, I made (it) very clear where those missiles came from. They didn’t come from Yemen. These were Iranian missiles launched by the Iranians,” Pompeo told Arab News.

“This continued effort to undermine the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and to threaten people, whether they’re in Dhahran — where there are many, many Americans — or they’re in Riyadh, is something that poses a real threat to stability throughout the Middle East.

“Our administration here in America, administrations all throughout Europe, have a responsibility to push back against this and impose real cost on the Iranians for this kind of misbehavior. It’s quite something that, somehow, missile launches of Iranian missiles have now become, (for) this administration at least, something that isn’t viewed as requiring a direct response.

“There are few places in the world where this would be permitted to happen without a serious response from the Western world, and that would include a serious response, at least rhetorically, from the United Nations. I hope that that takes place.”

Pompeo said while it is “hard to know day-to-day” whether the risk today is higher than what it was a week or two weeks ago, we know this: Deterring the Iranian regime requires a consistent, sound message and a willingness to impose costs on the Iranian leadership.”

So, what does Pompeo make of the US military strikes in Syria last month on a site used by two Iranian-backed Iraqi militia groups, ostensibly in response to rocket attacks on American forces in Iraq? President Biden later described the strike as a message to Iran: “You can’t act with impunity, be careful.”

Pompeo said that “if the response to Iranian aggression is to throw some missiles into the desert, or hit a supply building in Syria, which imposes almost no cost on the Iranian regime itself, if those are the responses, then there is little “likelihood of being able to establish deterrents to protect and defend our soldiers who are stationed all across the Middle East, not just in Saudi Arabia, but throughout all the Middle East.

In his view, “we have an obligation to get that right and it’s going to take a strong American response to deter them.”

Encouraged perhaps by the successful campaign to get Biden to end the Trump-era Houthi “terrorist” designation, some religious, political and humanitarian leaders have recently signed a letter calling on the US president to lift economic sanctions on Syria. But Pompeo considers the Caesar Syria Civilian Protection Act “really important.”

“The great news was it was a bipartisan effort, this wasn’t just the Trump administration,” he told Arab News. “It empowered me as then-secretary of state to take real actions and respond under the authority of the Caesar Act. It was very effective. It put pressure on Syrian businessmen who had deep connections to Iran. It put pressure on Hezbollah and businesspeople who were underwriting Hezbollah.

“It was incredibly effective. I hope the Caesar Act and the enforcement of that by the administration will continue.”

Note: several short videos of Mike Pompeo interview by Arab News

Source: https://www.arabnews.com/node/1823276/middle-east

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Israel Is Right to Doubt Negotiations Will Work With Iran

Dore Gold — Wed, 03 Feb 2021 14:44:01 +0000

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei gestures during a meeting with organizers of events to mark the first anniversary of the killing of Iranian general Qassem Soleimani, in Tehran, Iran, Dec. 16, 2020. Photo: Official Khamenei Website / Handout via Reuters.

JNS.org – In August 2002, the Iranian opposition, known as the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), disclosed secret Iranian nuclear facilities at the Natanz enrichment plant, the Arak heavy-water production facility, the Isfahan uranium conversion plant, and other previously unknown Iranian facilities. Rather than negotiate access to these newly revealed sites by international atomic watchdogs, the United States proposed that Iran hold talks with the EU-3 powers (Britain, France, and Germany). The United States was busy with Iraq and the weapons of mass destruction (WMD) programs of Saddam Hussein. So it left the Europeans to do the heavy lifting on Iran.

The first deal with the EU-3 was struck on October 21, 2003 in Tehran. Iran agreed “to suspend all uranium enrichment activities.” But after the accord was reached, the two sides disagreed over the question of how to define “suspension.” For Europe, suspension meant freezing all enrichment activities. This was something that the Iranian leadership would not agree to. A second agreement was struck in Paris on November 15, 2004.

The Iranians wanted to leave the definition of “suspension” vague so that what they were committing to suspending would be unclear, which would allow Iran to build more centrifuges, for example. And the Iranians reversed themselves within months, declaring that they would manufacture centrifuges for uranium enrichment.

Uranium comes in two forms, or isotopes: U-235 and U-238. Only the lighter isotope, U-235, can undergo nuclear fission, releasing energy to power a reactor or an atomic bomb.

The father of the Iranian diplomatic approach was Hassan Rouhani, who served as Iran’s national security adviser and later as its head nuclear negotiator with the EU-3 (he is now president of Iran). It is essential to read what he said back in 2003 because of his subsequent advancement within the Iranian system. Decisions are ultimately made by the Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, but Rouhani is a major player. In a significant address, Rouhani made clear how he viewed the purpose of negotiations: “When we were negotiating with the Europeans in Tehran, we were installing equipment in parts of the facility in Isfahan.”

The negotiating process, in short, allowed Iran to steadily advance with its nuclear program.

The political philosophy of Iranian officials is certainly one major factor that is making a reliable negotiation difficult to imagine. But there was and remains a second problem with the Iranian approach: Tehran did not open up its facilities to unimpeded inspections.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) sought access to the Lavizan Technological Research Center, where the Western powers believed that Iran had conducted nuclear weapons research. The Iranians, however, demolished six buildings at Lavizan and then removed several meters of topsoil there so that no one could take soil samples. This type of behavior repeated itself at what was known as the Kalaya Electric Facility, where Iranian experts retiled the walls before inspectors arrived so that their swipes would not reveal that radioactive materials had been previously present. In other words, Iran was and still is predisposed to cheat.

Advocates of a new diplomatic path today need to demonstrate that somehow Iran has changed. Currently, there is little or no evidence that this is the case. Iran does not appear to be about to alter its behavior. In the meantime, it continues to be a dangerous power with both an advanced nuclear program and expansionist policies across the Middle East. It would be nice if this was not the case, but it is difficult to make a convincing case otherwise.

Dore Gold is the former Israeli ambassador to the United Nations and the current president of the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs.

This article was first published by the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs.

The opinions presented by Algemeiner bloggers are solely theirs and do not represent those of The Algemeiner, its publishers or editors. If you would like to share your views with a blog post on The Algemeiner, please be in touch through our Contact page.

Source: https://www.algemeiner.com/2021/02/03/israel-is-right-to-doubt-negotiations-will-work-with-iran/

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The post Israel Is Right to Doubt Negotiations Will Work With Iran first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

‘Completely untrustworthy’ – Iran leader bans import of US and UK-made COVID-19 vaccines

Yaron Steinbuch — Fri, 08 Jan 2021 00:42:56 +0000

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei —Reuters

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Friday banned the import of US and British-produced coronavirus vaccines, saying they were “completely untrustworthy.”

“It’s not unlikely they would want to contaminate other nations. Given our experience with France’s HIV-tainted blood supplies, French vaccines aren’t trustworthy either,” he said in a tweet accompanied by the hashtag #CoronaVaccine.

He was referring to a scandal in the 1980s in which blood infected with HIV was distributed in France, and later abroad, even after the government became aware of the problem, Agence France-Presse reported.

Hundreds of people in Iran were among those infected.

France’s then-Prime Minister Laurent Fabius was charged with manslaughter, but acquitted in 1999. His health minister was convicted but never punished.

The Islamic Republic has reported more than 1.2 million COVID-19 cases and over 56,000 deaths, according to the news agency.

Vials of Iranian domestic coronavirus disease (COVID-19) vaccine —Reuters

It has accused the US of hampering its access to vaccines through a strict sanctions regime.

Iran, the Middle Eastern country hardest hit by the pandemic, last month launched clinical trials of its own vaccine.

While food and medicine are technically exempt from the sanctions, international banks tend to refuse transactions involving Iran.

Last month, President Hassan Rouhani said that Washington had demanded that Tehran pay for the drugs through US banks, adding that he feared the US would seize the money.

Source: https://nypost.com/2021/01/08/ayatollah-khamenei-bans-imports-of-us-uk-covid-vaccines-to-iran/

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Iran reveals new missile base on the Persian Gulf

Deutsche Welle — Fri, 08 Jan 2021 00:17:50 +0000

Iranian military forces have shown off their Naval Missile Facility on the coast of the Persian Gulf and boasted of their extended defensive capabilities.

The new facility was built on the Persian Gulf, a hotly contested maritime region that plays a key role in global oil exports

Iran’s Revolutionary Guards (IRGC) published photos of a new underground missile base on the coast of the Persian Gulf on Friday, amid increasing tensions between the Islamic Republic and the US.

“The base is one of several bases housing the Guards’ Navy’s strategic missiles,” state media quoted IRGC Chief Commander Hossein Salami, regarding the base located somewhere in the province of Hormozgan.

“Our logic in defending the territorial integrity, the independence of the country, and the achievements of the Islamic Revolution is strengthening,” Salami said, according to the national newspaper Mehr News.

Strengthened defensive capabilities

The commander also boasted that the new Naval Missile Facility held long-range missiles with pin-point precision and “huge destructive power.”

Salami claimed that the base would strengthen Iran’s defensive capabilities, especially against “the enemy’s electronic warfare equipment.”

Rising tensions between the Islamic Republic and the US came to a head-on Monday when Revolutionary Guards seized a South Korean tanker in the straits of Hormuz.

The relations between the two sides were put under extra strain after President Donald Trump pulled the US out of the 2015 nuclear deal and reimposed heavy sanctions on the country.

Open hostilities almost broke out in January 2020 after the assassination of Iran’s top general Qassim Soleimani by a US drone strike in Iraq.

Top Iranian lawmakers have shown a willingness to return to negotiations with President-elect Joe Biden, however, the country’s powerful conservative establishment has continued to stoke the flames with a promise to ramp up uranium enrichment.

A warning to Iran’s enemies

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei also spoke on Friday in a live television broadcast praising the country’s defensive capabilities.

He claimed that with the ability to shoot down drones and hit the US Ain al-Assad air force base in Iraq — in response to Soleimani’s death — the country’s foes would have to take into account Iran’s ability to militarily defend itself.

The Persian Gulf has been a repeated zone of conflict between the US and the Islamic Republic

The IRGC said last year that they had built underground “missile cities” along the Gulf coastline, warning of a “nightmare for Iran’s enemies.”

Salami praised the developments of Iran’s defense systems highlighting the “great progress at the level of target intelligence systems, search systems, as well as missile radar systems.”

Source: https://www.dw.com/en/iran-reveals-new-missile-base-on-the-persian-gulf/a-56170071

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The post Iran reveals new missile base on the Persian Gulf first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

Experts say Iran likely to delay retaliation against Israel for assassinated nuclear scientist

Ariel Ben Solomon — Fri, 11 Dec 2020 20:02:01 +0000

Independent Iran researcher Amir Toumaj said there is both a “general call for immediate retaliation and others pushing for a delayed response, arguing Tehran shouldn’t fall into a trap ahead of talks with the Biden administration.”

Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, Feb. 6, 2016. Credit: Wikimedia Commons.

(December 11, 2020 / JNS) In the aftermath of the assassination of top nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh last month, Iranian officials were quick to blame Israel and vowed imminent revenge.

While Israel has put its embassies abroad on high alert and continues to monitor threats along its borders from Iran and its terror proxies, such as Hezbollah to the north, experts seemed to agree that Tehran is likely to delay a revenge attack until the opportune moment.

Amir Toumaj, an independent Iran researcher, told JNS that among officials and media, there is both a “general call for immediate retaliation and others pushing for a delayed response, arguing that Tehran shouldn’t fall into a trap ahead of talks with the Biden administration.”

At the end of November, Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called for “definitive punishment of the perpetrators and those who ordered it” regarding the killing of Fakhrizadeh, according to AP.

Khamenei called Fakhrizadeh “the country’s prominent and distinguished nuclear and defensive scientist.”

Iran’s President Hassan Rouhani declared that “we will respond to the assassination of martyr Fakhrizadeh in a proper time. The Iranian nation is smarter than falling into the trap of the Zionists. They are thinking to create chaos,” according to the report.

Toumaj noted considerable calls within the regime to respond to the latest assassination, as well as previous attacks.

“There’s a lot of pressure now in the IRGC [Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps] and the government’s supporters for a response sooner rather than later, not only because this assassination was near the heart of the capital, but also because of the assassination of former general Qassem Soleimani and the Natanz explosion in the summer,” he said.

An American drone took out Soleimani in January, and Iran admitted that a fire seriously damaged its Natanz nuclear facility in July. A Middle Eastern intelligence official told The New York Times that Israel planted a bomb at the facility, and a member of the IRGC, who was briefed on the matter, also said an explosive device was used.

‘Time is on their side’

Efraim Inbar, president of the Jerusalem Institute for Strategic Studies, said the assassination of the Iranian scientist and other successful attacks on Iran are “most likely attributable to fortunate operational circumstances.”

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani and his vice president, Eshaq Jahangiri after a cabinet meeting, March 17, 2016. Credit: Mahmoud Hosseini via Wikimedia Commons.

Inbar downplayed the timing of the assassination as connected to the results of the U.S. election and the incoming Biden administration, which has promised to resume negotiations and possibly re-enter the Iran nuclear deal.

As to the question about when Iran will seek revenge, he said that it is wrong to assume that Iran will retaliate immediately.

“They have time, and they will do something after they think it is doable and effective,” he said. “Patience is their game. Time is on their side as they progress on the nuclear path.”

Professor Ronen Cohen, Iran expert and the head of the Middle East & Central Asia Research Center at Ariel University, said the Iranians are undergoing a challenging period due to both the coronavirus and crippling U.S. sanctions.

Iran has been the hardest-hit country in the Middle East with 1 million recorded cases of COVID-19 and 50,000 deaths as a result. And in the past few years, a series of new sanctions have been enacted by the Trump administration that has had a profound effect on Tehran’s economy, as seen in nationwide protests before the pandemic hit earlier this year.

“The economy is suffering, and Iranian officials have to deal with rumors of the death of Khamenei,” he said.

An official close to Khamenei denied recent rumors on social media that the 81-year-old’s health has deteriorated, Reuters reported on Monday.

Cohen says that Iran-backed Hezbollah in Lebanon and Iranian forces are in no position to attack Israel, even from Syrian territory.

“At the end of the day, Iran is hurting and seeks revenge,” he said. “However, the risk now is too high, and it will wait to retaliate when it is sure that the result will satisfy the political and military leadership.”

Source: https://www.jns.org/experts-say-iran-likely-to-delay-retaliation-against-israel-for-assassinated-nuclear-scientist/

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The post Experts say Iran likely to delay retaliation against Israel for assassinated nuclear scientist first appeared on Garner Ted Armstrong Evangelistic Association.

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