Thomas Friedman, "Why Is Trump Fighting ISIS in Syria?": A Question for Tom

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In his latest New York Times op-ed entitled "Why Is Trump Fighting ISIS in Syria?," Thomas Friedman writes:

"This is a time for Trump to be Trump — utterly cynical and unpredictable. ISIS right now is the biggest threat to Iran, Hezbollah, Russia and pro-Shiite Iranian militias — because ISIS is a Sunni terrorist group that plays as dirty as Iran and Russia."

Friedman concludes:

"[W]here is Trump’s Twitter feed when we need it? He should be tweeting every day this message: “Russia, Iran and Hezbollah have become the protectors of a Syrian regime that uses poison gas on babies! Babies! Russia, Iran, Hezbollah, Assad — poison gas enablers. Sad.”

Do not let them off the hook! We need to make them own what they’ve become — enablers of a Syria that uses poison gas on children. Believe it or not, they won’t like being labeled that way. Trump needs to use his global Twitter feed strategically. Barack Obama never played this card. Trump needs to slam it down every day. It creates leverage.

Syria is not a knitting circle. Everyone there plays dirty, deviously and without mercy. Where’s that Trump when we need him?"

"Barack Obama never played this card"? In fact, Obama folded even before the cards were dealt.

Iran is dirty, devious and without mercy? You don't say! But here's a quick question for you, Tom. Syria did not eliminate its stockpiles of chemical weapons as we were told by John Kerry, Susan Rice and Obama's other toadies. Do you really think Iran is playing by the rules and abiding by the terms of that other Obama legacy achievement, the unsigned nuclear deal?

Go ahead, Tom, card player that you are, give us the odds!

Rashid Khalidi, "John Kerry and Israel: Too Little and Too Late": More Israel Bashing From The New York Times

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Do you remember the controversy surrounding Obama and Rashid Khalidi?  The Los Angeles Times still refuses to release the video of Obama speaking at a 2003 going-away party honoring Khalidi, at which virulent anti-Semitism was expressed by other speakers. Well, it should come as no surprise that today, in the aftermath of John Kerry's speech earlier this week attacking Israeli settlements on the West Bank, Khalidi is being given space on The New York Times op-ed page to vent his spleen at Israel. Described by the Times as "a professor of Arab studies at Columbia who was an adviser to the Palestinian delegation during peace negotiations from 1991 to 1993" (no mention, of course, by the Times of the relationship between Obama and Khalidi or the video stashed away in a Los Angeles Times safe), Khalidi bashes Israel in his Times guest op-ed entitled "John Kerry and Israel: Too Little and Too Late":

"During Mr. Obama’s eight years in office, the illegal Israeli settler population has swelled by 100,000, to well over 600,000. Simultaneously, for eight years Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has directed a barrage of calculated slights, insults and acts of disrespect at the president of the United States. The Obama administration has finally reacted with Mr. Kerry’s speech and by allowing Resolution 2334, which condemns Israeli settlement expansion, to pass in the United Nations Security Council. By doing so, the United States simply acted in accordance with international law and the global consensus of nearly 50 years.

Meanwhile, a third generation of Palestinian children is growing up under a brutal occupation and Gaza has been under siege for a decade. Palestinians are obliged to seek the permission of the Israeli military for the most basic of needs, such as medical treatment, or to travel abroad or even just to Jerusalem."

Fascinating. Khalidi would have us believe that there are no hospitals in the West Bank or Gaza. In fact, there are some 60 hospitals and medical centers in the West Bank and Gaza, and although I am not claiming that Palestinian medical facilities are on a par with Israeli facilities, it is worth noting that average life expectancy in the West Bank is 75.91, compared with 75.69 in Hungary, 75.41 in China, 75.05 in Saudi Arabia, 74.57 in Turkey, 74.35 in Jordan, 73.70 in Egypt, and 71.15 in Iran.

Khalidi describes Israel's "occupation" of the West Bank as "brutal"? Consider what Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, now in his twelfth year of his four-year term in office, declared to Jackson Diehl in 2009 (my emphasis in red):

"'I will wait for Hamas to accept international commitments. I will wait for Israel to freeze settlements,' he said. 'Until then, in the West Bank we have a good reality . . . the people are living a normal life.'"

This statement was made after Abbas refused Israeli Prime Minister Olmert's 2008 peace offer, providing the Palestinians with an independent state along the 1967 lines together with agreed upon land swaps and Palestinian control of east Jerusalem. 

As for Khalidi's claim that "During Mr. Obama’s eight years in office, the illegal Israeli settler population has swelled by 100,000, to well over 600,000." An answer to this rubbish is to be found in an editorial in today's Washington Post entitled "On Israel, we’re right back where Obama started," which informs us (my emphasis in red):

"THE OBAMA administration is ending eight years of failed Middle East diplomacy exactly where it began in 2009 — with an exaggerated and misguided focus on Israeli settlement construction. As he railed at the continuing growth of West Bank Jewish housing on Wednesday with a prolixity that Fidel Castro would have admired, Secretary of State John F. Kerry sounded a lot like President Obama during the early months of his first term, when he insisted that the Israeli government freeze all construction as a starting point for negotiations on a Palestinian state.

. . . .

Mr. Kerry’s speech was, above all, a vivid demonstration of the administration’s inability to learn from its mistakes or adjust the ideological tenets that Mr. Obama brought to office.

. . . .

In fact, the two-state solution remains entirely viable, as even the settlement statistics cited by Mr. Kerry demonstrate. The administration asserts that the Jewish population in the West Bank has increased by 100,000 since 2009 — but by Mr. Kerry’s account, 80 percent of that growth was in areas Israel would likely annex in any settlement. In eight years, 20,000 people have been added to communities in territory likely to become part of Palestine — an area where 2.75 million Arabs now live. That growth of about 3 percent per annum, the product of a restraint for which Mr. Netanyahu received no White House credit, means that the Jewish population outside Israel’s West Bank fence may have decreased as a percentage of the overall population even as Mr. Obama and Mr. Kerry have made it the focal point of U.S. policy."

Perhaps the WaPo editorial should have also observed what was acknowledged by Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat: Israeli settlements have been built on only some 1.1% of the West Bank (see: http://www.haaretz.com/news/diplomacy-defense/erekat-olmert-offered-palestinians-territorial-equivalent-of-west-bank-1.393484).


Bottom line: Khalidi's Israel bashing op-ed amounts to just one more effort by The New York Times to discredit Israel during the waning days of the Obama administration. Despicable.

[I sent this blog item to Andrew Rosenthal, former editorial page editor of The New York Times:

Dear Andrew,

I thought you might be interested.

Jeffrey

Rosenthal's response:

I'm not sure why. But thanks.

Andy

Why am I not surprised?]

David Sanger, "John Kerry, in a Final, Pointed Plea, Will Outline a Vision of Mideast Peace": Blind Man's Bluff

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In a myopic New York Times article entitled "John Kerry, in a Final, Pointed Plea, Will Outline a Vision of Mideast Peace," David Sanger writes of John Kerry's speech today, which is intended "to shape the outlines of a Middle East peace deal":

"The decision to go ahead with his speech in the waning days of the administration is characteristic of Mr. Kerry, a serial negotiator who over the past four years traveled the world on three major missions: an Israeli-Palestinian accord, the Iranian nuclear accord, and a cease-fire and political accord for Syria. He will leave office on Jan. 20 having achieved the nuclear deal, but having tried and failed on the other two."

Kerry's nuclear deal with Iran was an achievement? Oh really. As reported by Jenna Lifhits in a December 25, 2016 Weekly Standard article entitled "U.N. Agency Publishes Secret Iran Deal Docs On Exemptions Obama Admin Dismissed":

"Iran was given secret exemptions allowing the country to exceed restrictions set out by the landmark nuclear deal inked last year, some of which were made public this week by the United Nations nuclear watchdog and others that are likely still being withheld, according to diplomatic sources and a top nuclear expert who spoke to THE WEEKLY STANDARD.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on Friday posted documents revealing that Iran had been given exemptions in January that permit the country to stockpile uranium in excess of the 300 kilogram limit set by the nuclear deal, experts said. The agreements had been kept secret for almost a year, but recent reports indicated that the Trump administration intended to make them public."

In fact Kerry's unsigned Swiss cheese arrangement with Iran, negotiated in Geneva and shot through with holes, was anything but an achievement.

Sanger goes on to say concerning last week's Security Council resolution denouncing Israeli West Bank settlements:

"'We did not discuss the substance of the resolution at any time with the United States,' Gerard van Bohemen, New Zealand’s ambassador to the United Nations, said later, disputing Mr. Netanyahu’s account that the vote was orchestrated in Washington. 'We did not know how the United States would vote.'

The surprise was palpable. Román Oyarzun Marchesi of Spain, which holds the rotating presidency of the Council, asked for a show of hands in support of the resolution: 14 hands went up. He asked for a show of hands against: zero hands went up. A gasp was heard in the Council chamber. It meant that the United States, which can unilaterally veto a resolution as a permanent member of the Security Council, had not done so."

The surprise was "palpable"? Yeah, right. As reported today in a Times of Israel article entitled "Israel: US pressured Ukraine to support anti-settlement resolution":

"An Israeli official said Wednesday that highest-level US administration officials phoned Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko directly to pressure him to support the United Nations Security Council resolution against Israeli settlements.

'Either Obama or Biden spoke to Poroshenko about the matter,' a senior Israeli official told The Times of Israel, elaborating on Israel’s claims that the US worked behind the scenes to bolster the resolution and to ensure that it was supported by all the other countries on the council.

According to one highly placed Israeli official who spoke to Tablet Magazine, it was Biden who personally intervened to ensure that Ukraine would support the resolution. 'Did Biden put pressure on the Ukrainians? Categorically yes,' said a source within the Israeli government. 'That Biden told them to do it is 1000% true,' he said."

Nauseating. Enough said.

Thomas Friedman, "Impossible Missions": Yes, Wisconsin (Not Virginia), There Is a Santa Claus

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Yes, Virginia Wisconsin, there is a Santa Claus. Could it be that Donald and Hillary, i.e. Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhees, will not be battling it out in November? Thank you, badgers! It had been pretty bleak until last night.

On the subject of bleak (and dull-witted), Thomas Friedman, in a New York Times op-ed entitled "Impossible Missions," discusses Professor Michael Mandelbaum's new book called “Mission Failure: America and the World in the Post-Cold War Era.” Warmly recommending the book, Friedman writes:

"In earlier historical epochs the world relied on imperial powers to come in and control zones of weak governance, as the Ottomans did for 500 years in the Middle East. Then it relied on colonial powers. Then it relied on homegrown kings, colonels and dictators to maintain order.

But what if we’re now in a post-imperial, post-colonial and post-authoritarian age? The kings, colonels and dictators of old did not have to deal with amplified citizens deeply connected to one another and the world with smartphones. The old autocrats also had vast oil resources or aid from superpowers in the Cold War to buy off their people. What if they now have bulging populations, dwindling oil revenues and can’t buy off their people or shut them up?

The only option is more consensual government and social contracts among equal citizens."

Ah yes, Arab Spring II and another Green Revolution in Iran! I can assure you that Morsi and Khamenei know of other options. Go back to sleep, Tom.

Meanwhile, on the subject of Iran, Congressman Ed Royce, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, expresses concern in a Washington Post opinion piece entitled "The United States must not aid and abet Iranian money laundering," that the Obama administration intends to provide Iran with access to the American financial system in exchange for . . . nothing. Royce writes:

"Last summer, in testimony to Congress, Lew vowed, 'Iranian banks will not be able to clear U.S. dollars through New York, hold correspondent account relationships with U.S. financial institutions, or enter into financing arrangements with U.S. banks.' As the secretary made clear, 'Iran, in other words, will continue to be denied access to the world’s largest financial and commercial market.'

Yet when I questioned Lew just two weeks ago about whether he stood by this testimony, he refused to give a direct answer. And so this appears to be just the latest in a long pattern of concessions to protect the president’s 'legacy' deal. In recent months, the administration gutted a new law to strengthen the visa waiver program to please the Iranians and has imposed only minimal sanctions on Iran’s missile program — even as Iran launches missiles stamped with the words 'Israel must be wiped off the face of the earth.'"

You mean to say that the Obama administration, which promised Americans that if they liked their doctors and healthcare plans, they could keep them, in order to sell Obama's "legacy" Affordable Care Act, also lied to Congress to sell his "legacy" nuclear deal with Iran? Yes, I know: Obama's omniscient ends justify his unscrupulous means.

And so we had John Kerry telling us that Iran "absolutely" deserved access to US dollars, although none other than Obama recently acknowledged that Iran is not abiding by the "spirit" of the nuclear deal, and notwithstanding Iran's test launches of ballistic missiles.

The ballistic missiles? As reported by Adam Kredo in a Washington Free Beacon article entitled "Congress Investigating Obama Admin Deception on Iran Nuke Deal":

"[C]ongressional leaders are concerned that the administration no longer considers recent Iranian ballistic missile tests a 'violation' of United Nations Security Council Resolution 2231, which codifies the nuclear deal.

Top administration officials including Secretary of State John Kerry vowed to Congress that Iran would be legally prohibited from carrying out ballistic missile tests under the resolution.

Samantha Power, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., shifted course last week, refusing to call recent Iranian launches a 'violation' in a letter she signed criticizing those launches."

Repercussions in the Middle East owing to Obama's duplicity? Read what Yousef Al Otaiba, the ambassador of the United Arab Emirates to the US, has to say in a Wall Street Journal opinion piece entitled "One Year After the Iran Nuclear Deal" about Obama's promise that the nuclear deal with Iran would "make the world safer":

"Sadly, behind all the talk of change, the Iran we have long known—hostile, expansionist, violent—is alive and well, and as dangerous as ever. We wish it were otherwise. In the United Arab Emirates, we are seeking ways to coexist with Iran. Perhaps no country has more to gain from normalized relations with Tehran. Reducing tensions across the less than 100-mile-wide Arabian Gulf could help restore full trade ties, energy cooperation and cultural exchanges, and start a process to resolve a 45-year territorial dispute.

Since the nuclear deal, however, Iran has only doubled down on its posturing and provocations. In October, November and again in early March, Iran conducted ballistic-missile tests in violation of United Nations Security Council resolutions.
In December, Iran fired rockets dangerously close to a U.S. aircraft carrier in the Strait of Hormuz, just weeks before it detained a group of American sailors. In February, Iranian Defense Minister Hossein Dehghan visited Moscow for talks to purchase more than $8 billion in Russian fighter jets, planes and helicopters.

In Yemen, where peace talks now hold some real promise, Iran’s disruptive interference only grows worse. Last week, the French navy seized a large cache of weapons on its way from Iran to support the Houthis in their rebellion against the U.N.-backed legitimate Yemeni government. In late February, the Australian navy intercepted a ship off the coast of Oman with thousands of AK-47s and rocket-propelled grenades. And last month, a senior Iranian military official said Tehran was ready to send military 'advisers' to assist the Houthis.

The interference doesn’t stop there. Since the beginning of the year, Tehran and its proxies have increased their efforts to provide armor-piercing explosive devices to Shiite cells in Bahrain and Saudi Arabia. A former Iranian general and close adviser to Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called for Iran to annex all of Bahrain. And in Syria, Iran continues to deploy Hezbollah militias and its own Iranian Revolutionary Guard to prop up Syria’s Bashar Assad.

. . . .

If the carrots of engagement aren’t working, we must not be afraid to bring back the sticks. Recent half measures against Iran’s violations of the ballistic-missile ban are not enough. If the aggression continues, the U.S. and the global community should make clear that Iran will face the full range of sanctions and other steps still available under U.N. resolutions and in the nuclear deal itself."

"Bring back the sticks"? Reinstate the sanctions? Sorry, but not if it means that a narcissistic Obama must acknowledge that he was dead wrong.

David Brooks, "I Miss Barack Obama": I Don't

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In an editorial entitled "North Korea’s rocket launch shows that Mr. Obama’s ‘strategic patience’ has failed," The Washington Post responds to North Korea's recent launch of a long-range rocket by observing:

"The three-stage rocket launched Sunday, which supposedly put a satellite into Earth’s orbit, could also serve as an intercontinental missile. If North Korea has succeeded, as it claims it has, in miniaturizing a nuclear warhead, Mr. Kim could target Hawaii and Alaska, or perhaps even the western U.S. mainland. The threat is not imminent — and yet it is likely to become so if the United States does not devise a more effective strategy for containing and deterring the Kim regime.

President Obama’s policy since 2009, 'strategic patience,' has failed. The policy has mostly consisted of ignoring North Korea while mildly cajoling China to pressure the regime. As the supplier of most of the isolated country’s energy and food, Beijing has enormous leverage. But Chinese President Xi Jinping appears even more committed than his predecessors to the doctrine that it is preferable to tolerate the Kim regime — and its nuclear proliferation — than do anything that might destabilize it."

WaPo's conclusion: "'Strategic patience' is no longer a viable option."

North Korea is Obama's only overseas failure? What about Iran, which promptly engaged in ballistic missile tests in violation of UN Security Council resolutions subsequent to entering into the unsigned nuclear agreement with Obama and friends. The agreement unfroze more than $100 billion of Iranian assets, which, according to even John Kerry, will be used to finance terrorism.

And then there's also the Syrian mess. Remarkably, Roger Cohen, who supported the nuclear deal with Iran, did not mince his words when lambasting Obama's inaction in a New York Times op-ed entitled "America’s Syrian Shame,":

"Obama’s Syrian agonizing, his constant what-ifs and recurrent 'what then?' have also lead to the slaughter in Paris and San Bernardino. They have contributed to a potential unraveling of the core of the European Union as internal borders eliminated on a free continent are re-established as a response to an unrelenting refugee tide — to which the United States has responded by taking in around 2,500 Syrians since 2012, or about 0.06 percent of the total."

All of which brings me to David Brooks's Times op-ed of today's date entitled "I Miss Barack Obama." Brooks concludes:

"No, Obama has not been temperamentally perfect. Too often he’s been disdainful, aloof, resentful and insular. But there is a tone of ugliness creeping across the world, as democracies retreat, as tribalism mounts, as suspiciousness and authoritarianism take center stage.

Obama radiates an ethos of integrity, humanity, good manners and elegance that I’m beginning to miss, and that I suspect we will all miss a bit, regardless of who replaces him."

"[D]isdainful, aloof, resentful and insular"? Sounds to me like a narcissistic personality disorder.

Integrity and humanity? Pardon my French: Horseshit!

Eric Schmitt and Ben Hubbard, "U.S. Revamping Rebel Force Fighting ISIS in Syria": Obama in Cahoots With Iran to Save Assad

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In a lead New York Times article entitled "U.S. Revamping Rebel Force Fighting ISIS in Syria," Eric Schmitt and Ben Hubbard write:

"In an acknowledgment of severe shortcomings in its effort to create a force of moderate rebels to battle the Islamic State in Syria, the Pentagon is drawing up plans to significantly revamp the program by dropping larger numbers of fighters into safer zones as well as providing better intelligence and improving their combat skills.

The proposed changes come after a Syrian affiliate of Al Qaeda attacked, in late July, many of the first 54 Syrian graduates of the military’s training program and the rebel unit they came from. A day before the attack, two leaders of the American-backed group and several of its fighters were captured.

. . . .

The 54 Syrian fighters supplied by the Syrian opposition group Division 30 were the first group of rebels deployed under a $500 million train-and-equip program authorized by Congress last year. It is an overt program run by United States Special Forces, with help from other allied military trainers, and is separate from a parallel covert program run by the C.I.A.

After a year of trying, however, the Pentagon is still struggling to find recruits to fight the Islamic State without also battling the forces of President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, their original adversary."

Questions:

• Why is Congress not asking how $500 million was appropriated to train a Syrian rebel unit which lost its leaders and was mauled within days of being sent to fight? Does it remind you of the Bay of Pigs? It should.
• Why is this American-backed unit only intended to fight the Islamic State and not Syrian President Assad (John Kerry's "dear friend"), who is an Iranian vassal?
• Why does it not matter to Obama and friends that Assad has killed many more Syrians than the Islamic State?

As observed several days ago in a Washington Post opinion piece entitled "The horrific results of Obama’s failure in Syria" by Michael Gerson:

"For four years, the Obama administration has engaged in what Frederic Hof, former special adviser for transition in Syria, calls a 'pantomime of outrage.' Four years of strongly worded protests, and urgent meetings and calls for negotiation — the whole drama a sickening substitute for useful action.

. . . .

What explains Obama’s high tolerance for humiliation and mass atrocities in Syria? The Syrian regime is Iran’s proxy, propped up by billions of dollars each year. And Obama wanted nothing to interfere with the prospects for a nuclear deal with Iran. He was, as Hof has said, 'reluctant to offend the Iranians at this critical juncture.' So the effective concession of Syria as an Iranian zone of influence is just one more cost of the president’s legacy nuclear agreement."

See also Fred Hiatt's Washington Post opinion piece entitled "Obama’s Syria achievement," in which WaPo's editorial page editor writes:

"This may be the most surprising of President Obama’s foreign-policy legacies: not just that he presided over a humanitarian and cultural disaster of epochal proportions, but that he soothed the American people into feeling no responsibility for the tragedy."

Obama, the first invertebrate ever to occupy the Oval Office, clearly knows no shame.

29 Scientists Praise Nuclear Deal: Obama Gets Desperate

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In a lead New York Times article entitled "29 U.S. Scientists Praise Iran Nuclear Deal in Letter to Obama" by William J. Broad, we are informed:

"Twenty-nine of the nation’s top scientists — including Nobel laureates, veteran makers of nuclear arms and former White House science advisers — wrote to President Obama on Saturday to praise the Iran deal, calling it innovative and stringent.

The letter, from some of the world’s most knowledgeable experts in the fields of nuclear weapons and arms control, arrives as Mr. Obama is lobbying Congress, the American public and the nation’s allies to support the agreement.

The two-page letter may give the White House arguments a boost after the blow Mr. Obama suffered on Thursday when Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, a Democrat and among the most influential Jewish voices in Congress, announced he would oppose the deal, which calls for Iran to curb its nuclear program and allow inspections in return for an end to international oil and financial sanctions."

Question: Did even one of these scientists read the secret side agreements between the International Atomic Energy Agency and Iran, governing IAEA inspections of suspect nuclear weapons development sites? Even Kerry and Moniz have acknowledged that they have not seen these agreements. Without reading these agreements, how can these scientists conclude that Obama's deal with Iran's Supreme Leader Khamenei is "stringent"?

Moreover, did the scientists' letter mention that Iran is currently in the process of sanitizing the Parchin military base, where experimentation involving the use of nuclear weapons detonators occurred? Not a chance.

The scientists' letter claims:

"As you have stated, this deal does not take any options off the table for you or any future president."

Sound familiar? It should: This has long been a West Wing sound bite, and it is more than a little peculiar that a group of scientists are making this spurious claim, which is patently outside the realm of their expertise. (Does anyone, least of all Iran, believe that Obama is capable of military action?)

Obama is getting desperate.

Stephen F. Hayes and William Kristol, "Demand the Documents": Iranian Ties to al-Qaeda Hidden by Obama Adminstration

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"I think they have a policy of opposition to us and a great enmity, but I have no specific knowledge of a plan by Iran to actually destroy us."

- John Kerry, response to Congressman Ted Poe, July 28, 2015

Kerry was obfuscating the truth.

In a Weekly Standard article entitled "Demand the Documents," Stephen F. Hayes and William Kristol tell us that the Obama administration is hiding documents that link Iran with al-Qaeda. Hayes and Kristol write:

"We have been told by six current or former intelligence officials that the collection of documents captured in the raid on Osama bin Laden’s compound includes explosive information on Iran’s relationship with al Qaeda over the past two decades, including details of Iran’s support for al Qaeda’s attacks on Americans.

. . . .

Among the most significant were documents that shed new light on the complicated relationship between Iran and al Qaeda. Even the Obama administration has acknowledged the relationship. In 2011, the administration designated six al Qaeda operatives who were responsible for what officials described as al Qaeda’s lifeline. The network was based in Iran. 'This network serves as the core pipeline through which al Qaeda moves money, facilitators, and operatives,' according to the Treasury Department’s designation. In an interview with The Weekly Standard at the time, a senior Obama administration official involved in the designation said, 'Without this network, al Qaeda’s ability to recruit and collect funds would be severely damaged.'

. . . .

Contacted about the status of al Qaeda’s Iran network earlier this spring, two intelligence officials confirmed that it was still functioning and still critical to al Qaeda operations.

. . . .

The Obama administration does not want the bin Laden documents released. To date, the administration has made public fewer than 150 documents out of more than a million, despite a statutory requirement to expedite the release of the collection."

Would this information impact upon public perception of Obama's legacy-creating nuclear deal with Iran's Supreme Leader Khamenei? Of course. Would this information impact upon the upcoming Congressional vote on the nuclear deal? Absolutely. However, Obama's legacy-creating deal must come first, regardless of the danger.

Roger Cohen, "One Congressman’s Iran": Shame on Sander Levin!

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Representative Sander M. Levin, Democrat of Michigan, who decided to support Obama's nuclear deal with Khamenei, should be concerned when he receives the blessing of Roger ("Iran is not totalitarian") Cohen. In his latest New York Times op-ed entitled "One Congressman’s Iran," Cohen begins:

"Representative Sander M. Levin, Democrat of Michigan and the longest-serving Jewish member of the House, said something important this week: 'In my view, the only anchors in public life are to dig deeply into the facts and consult broadly and then to say what you believe.'"

Levin dug deeply into the nuclear deal with Iran? Heck no! He couldn't even bother waiting to learn what appears in the secret side agreements between the International Atomic Energy Agency and Iran, never seen by John Kerry or Ernest Moniz, which lay out the terms for IAEA inspections of Iranian military sites, such as Parchin, where nuclear detonator tests were conducted. And those terms are not pretty: Iran itself will be relied upon to supply requested soil samples to the IAEA.

Cohen continues:

"Levin’s reflection led him to the sober, accurate conclusion that the agreement is 'the best way to achieve' the goal of preventing Iran from advancing toward a nuclear weapon, an outcome that will make Israel, the Middle East and the world 'far more secure.' Not the ideal way, the perfect way, or a foolproof way, but, in the real world of ineradicable Iranian nuclear know-how, the best way attainable. That is also the view of other parties to the deal — the not insignificant or unserious powers of Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany."

Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany all wish to "make Israel, the Middle East and the world 'far more secure'"? I suppose that is why China will now be selling 150 J-10 fighter jets to Iran and Russia will now be selling 100 refueling aircraft to Iran, allowing the mullahs to attack any other country in the Middle East, including, of course, Israel.

I suppose that a 60-member German trade delegation, which visited Iran earlier this month, was also concerned with the security of Israel.

France? As reported by Josh Rogin in a Bloomberg article entitled "Top French Official Contradicts Kerry on Iran Deal":

"Jacques Audibert, is now the senior diplomatic adviser to President Francois Hollande. Before that, as the director general for political affairs in the Foreign Ministry from 2009 to 2014, he led the French diplomatic team in the discussions with Iran and the P5+1 group. Earlier this month, he met with Democrat Loretta Sanchez and Republican Mike Turner, both top members of the House Armed Services Committee, to discuss the Iran deal. The U.S. ambassador to France, Jane Hartley, was also in the room.

According to both lawmakers, Audibert expressed support for the deal overall, but also directly disputed Kerry’s claim that a Congressional rejection of the Iran deal would result in the worst of all worlds, the collapse of sanctions and Iran racing to the bomb without restrictions.

'He basically said, if Congress votes this down, there will be some saber-rattling and some chaos for a year or two, but in the end nothing will change and Iran will come back to the table to negotiate again and that would be to our advantage,' Sanchez told me in an interview. 'He thought if the Congress voted it down, that we could get a better deal.'"

Shame on you, Sander Levin! You might be a friend of Obama, and true blue to the Democratic Party, but you are no friend of Israel at a time when the Jewish State is again being threatened with extinction by a country being handed a nuclear arsenal within 15 years at most!

Iran: Kerry Misleads Congressman Ted Poe

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As reported today by The Times of Israel in an article entitled "In Congress, Kerry unsure if Iran wishes to destroy US":

"US Secretary of State John Kerry told a Republican lawmaker on Tuesday he did not know whether Iran sought to destroy the United States.

The exchange, during Kerry’s latest testimony to Congress on the July 14 nuclear accord between world powers and Iran, appeared to catch Kerry off-guard.

'Is it the policy of the ayatollah, if you can answer for him, that Iran wants to destroy the United States?' Texas Republican Lloyd 'Ted' Poe asked Kerry during the latter’s Tuesday appearance before the House Foreign Affairs Committee. 'Is that still their policy, as far as you know?'

Kerry responded: 'I don’t believe they’ve said that. I think they’ve said ‘Death to America,’ in their chants, but I have not seen this specific.'

'Well, I kind of take that to mean that they want us dead,' Poe replied. 'That would seem like that would be their policy. He said that. You don’t think that’s their policy? I’m not mincing words. Do you think it’s their policy to destroy us?'

'I think they have a policy of opposition to us and a great enmity, but I have no specific knowledge of a plan by Iran to actually destroy us.'"

However, as reported in a May 27, 2014 Algemeiner article entitled "Iran Supreme Leader Vows to Destroy America, Says Promoting Negotiation is Treason" by Joshua Levitt:

"In a speech to parliament, Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei on Sunday vowed to destroy the U.S., which he held responsible for distorting the world’s values and starting indiscriminate wars.

According to semi-official news agency Fars, Khamenei said,'Battle and jihad are endless because evil and its front continue to exist. … This battle will only end when the society can get rid of the oppressors’ front with America at the head of it, which has expanded its claws on human mind, body and thought. … This requires a difficult and lengthy struggle and need for great strides.'"

Nice try, John.

Kerry Visiting Egypt and Qatar but Will Steer His Swift Boat Clear of Israel

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US Secretary of State John Kerry will be traveling to Egypt and Qatar next week, to sell Obama's controversial nuclear deal with Iran, but he plans to steer his swift boat clear of Israel. Why not Israel? As reported in a Ynetnews article entitled "Kerry to visit region to discuss Iran deal, but skip Israel" by Yitzhak Benhorin:

"When asked why Kerry won't be visiting Israel, [US State Department spokesman John] Kirby said the secretary has spoken to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu many times over the past few weeks to discuss the agreement.

The latest phone call between the two was on July 16, after the agreement was signed."

The real reason why Kerry is not coming to is Israel is because of overwhelming disapproval of the nuclear deal among Israelis and the likelihood that he would be met in Israel with massive protest demonstrations.

In all fairness to Kerry, however, he also declined another dinner engagement in Damascus with his "dear friend" Bashar al-Assad.

Thomas Friedman, "Backing Up Our Wager With Iran": Blithering, Blathering Brainlessness

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Anyone who has studied contracts law knows that in order for there to be a binding agreement, there must be a meeting of the minds. However, as is becoming increasingly apparent, there is no meeting of the minds between the P5+1 and Iran. John Kerry has told the US that pursuant to the nuclear deal with Iran that Obama brokered, Iran will no longer be able to send funds or weapons to regional surrogates, i.e. Hezbollah in Lebanon, Assad in Syria, and the Houthis in Yemen. Contradicting Kerry, Susan Rice claims that Iran can only send funds to these proxies. However, contradicting both Kerry and Rice, Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi stated on Tuesday, "We have told them [the P5+1] in the negotiations that we will supply arms to anyone and anywhere necessary and will import weapons from anywhere we want and we have clarified this during the negotiations."

Or stated otherwise, there is no agreement with Iran, and Iran will continue to promote terror throughout the Middle East.

In his latest New York Times op-ed entitled "Backing Up Our Wager With Iran," a sycophantic Thomas Friedman praises Obama's deal with Khamenei. Friedman writes:

"[T]he diplomatic option structured by the Obama team — if properly implemented and augmented by muscular diplomacy — serves core American interests better than any options I hear coming from the deal’s critics: It prevents Iran from producing the fissile material to break out with a nuclear weapon for 15 years and creates a context that could empower the more pragmatic forces inside Iran over time — at the price of constraining, but not eliminating, Iran’s nuclear infrastructure and sanctions relief that will strengthen Tehran as a regional power."

The deal "prevents Iran from producing the fissile material to break out with a nuclear weapon for 15 years"? Tell me, Tom, do you truly believe that Iran will abide by the terms of the agreement over the course of 15 years and will not try to cheat in the interim? As observed by Michael Makovsky in a Weekly Standard article entitled "Iran’s Cheating":

"Iran has a long and proud history of cheating on its international nuclear agreements. Olli Heinonen, a former deputy director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) who once monitored Iran’s nuclear program, observed in 2013: 'If there is no undeclared installation today .  .  . it will be the first time in 20 years that Iran doesn’t have one.' Indeed, Iran’s main enrichment facility at Natanz was a covert facility that was only discovered in 2002, by the Mojahedin-e-Khalq, an Iranian opposition group. A year later, the European Union struck a deal with Iran to prevent it from spinning its centrifuges and beginning to enrich uranium. Yet for much of the deal, Iran was busy mastering its uranium supply chain. 'While we were talking with the Europeans in Tehran,” wrote Iran’s nuclear negotiator and now president Hassan Rouhani, 'we were installing equipment in parts of the [uranium conversion] facility at Isfahan. .  .  . In fact, by creating a calm environment, we were able to complete the work in Isfahan.' In 2009, the world learned of yet another clandestine enrichment plant, under a mountain at Fordow, that Iran was trying to construct.

. . . .

In the past year alone Iran has violated its international agreements at least three times. First, even though the interim Joint Plan of Action (JPOA) prohibited Iran from enriching uranium in any centrifuges that were not in use at the time the deal went into effect in January 2014, last November the IAEA caught Iran operating a new centrifuge—worse still, it was an advanced IR-5 model. Second, the JPOA required Iran to process any low-enriched uranium it produced during the deal’s term from the gaseous form used for enrichment into a solid that can be used as reactor fuel, so that it would not be readily available for further enrichment and potential breakout. As of February 2015, Iran had an excess of some 300 kilograms of low-enriched uranium, in violation of the deal’s terms. Third, in parallel to the JPOA, the IAEA and Iran signed a Framework for Cooperation under which Iran agreed to answer outstanding IAEA concerns about the possible military dimensions of its nuclear program. Iran answered only one question to the IAEA’s satisfaction and, for the past six months, has been stonewalling on the rest."

So, suddenly Iran is going to stop cheating? Yeah, right.

Friedman goes on to say that Obama is "betting that [the deal] will empower Iran’s moderate faction and put the country on a more favorable societal trajectory." The "moderate faction"? Oh, Friedman must be referring Iran's President Hassan Rouhani, "famous" for hanging gay men and bragging during the 2013 presidential election how he lulled the West into complacency while radically expanding Iran's nuclear weapons development program.

Tom Terrific suggest four things to increase the odds that Obama's "bet goes our way." First, Friedman calls for Obama to "appoint a respected military figure to oversee every aspect of implementing this deal." Appoint a "respected general"? That will help a lot, particularly when Iran is refusing to allow Americans to inspect its nuclear sites.

Second, Friedman says: "Congress should pass a resolution authorizing this and future presidents to use force to prevent Iran from ever becoming a nuclear weapons state. Iran must know now that the U.S. president is authorized to destroy — without warning or negotiation — any attempt by Tehran to build a bomb." Obama use force against Iran? Iran already knows that Obama is incapable of this.

Third, Friedman would have America "[f]ocus on the Iranian people" and "reach out to them in every way — visas, exchanges and scholarships." America wants more Iranians, handpicked by the Khamenei regime, in its midst? Good luck!

Fourth, Friedman declares that America should "[a]void a black-and-white view of the Middle East." He explains, "The idea that Iran is everywhere our enemy . . . is a mistake." Oh really? Iranian Supreme Leader Khamenei declared on Saturday that US policies are "180 degrees" opposed to those of Iran, and that "even after this deal our policy toward the arrogant US will not change." Khamenei's speech was accompanied by chants of "Death to America!"

When will someone from Obama's inner circle burst the president's bubble? It certainly won't come from Tom Friedman, who lacks either the integrity or the intelligence to inform the president that he made a fool's wager.

Dear Congress, Israel Implores You to Say No to Iran

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I sent the following op-ed to The Washington Post earlier today. Michael Larabee, their op-ed editor, kindly read my submission and just informed me that they're going to pass on the piece. Humor me and take a gander . . .

President Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu have less than a sanguine relationship. Obama’s disdain for Netanyahu is best exemplified by a 2011 open microphone faux pas in which America’s president told French President Sarkozy, "You are fed up with him, but I have to deal with him even more often than you." Examination, however, of the nuclear deal signed by the P5+1 with Iran in Vienna should transcend the enmity between Obama and Netanyahu. Israeli’s from Left to Right are frightened by this agreement with the mullahs.

As recently reported by The Jerusalem Post, 78 percent of Israelis believe the nuclear deal will "endanger Israel;" 71 percent think the deal will "bring Iran closer to a military nuclear capability;" and 47 percent "support an Israeli military strike on Iran if it would be necessary to prevent the Islamic state from getting nuclear weapons." Moreover, Israelis, most of whom have come under rocket and missile fire over the course of their lifetimes, generally have a good idea of what's good or bad for them, particularly when it involves existential concerns.

Why are Israelis more concerned by Iranian chants of marg bar Esra’il (“Death to Israel!”) than Americans are worried by chants of marg bar omrika (“Death to America!”) coming even after the Vienna agreement? Obviously, Israel is closer to Iran, and Israel is already in range of Iranian missiles, but the answer is more complex. Ze’ev Maghen, a professor of Persian Language and Islamic History at Shalem College and former chairman of the Department of Middle East Studies at Bar-Ilan University, noted in a 2009 Commentary article entitled “Eradicating the 'Little Satan'”:

“[T]here is no rational reason for any eruption of hostilities between Iran and Israel. The two countries do not even share a common border, and their national and economic interests are not in conflict. To the contrary, both have traditionally conceived their ‘frontline’ adversaries to be Arab states, and history has time and again thrown them into each other's arms, both before and even after the Islamic revolution of 1979.”

However, Prof. Maghen went on to observe in his article:

“The analysts and pundits are thus indeed correct in asserting that the Iranians do not really ‘mean it’ [i.e., Death to Israel!]. They fail to realize, however, that this is the very reason why they may well ‘do it.’ By casting an entire people as a parasitic infestation, by demonizing, delegitimizing, and dehumanizing them at home, in school, in the mosque and in the media, the quarter-century-old routine of Israel-hatred, added to 1,400 years of traditional Islamic anti-Semitism, has prepared in the minds of Iranians and their neighboring coreligionists the moral ground for the eradication of the state of Israel.”

Is Iran’s theocratic leadership “rational,” and would “mutually assured destruction” dissuade Iran from attacking Israel? Iran hangs gay men, stones to death women accused of adultery, savagely persecutes Baha'is, Christians, Kurds and Sunnis, jails and brutalizes journalists and political opponents, backs Shiite militias in Iraq that are engaged in ethnic cleansing, bombed a Jewish community center in distant Argentina, and executed a poet for "waging war on God." Is this rational? Moreover, as stated by former Iranian president Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, “Israel is much smaller than Iran in landmass and therefore far more vulnerable to nuclear attack.”

Is the Obama administration aware of the dangers posed to Israel by the agreement that it struck with Iran, granting the mullahs unobstructed access to a nuclear arsenal after 10-15 years – less if they cheat? Absolutely. Otherwise there would have been no reason for Susan Rice’s call on Saturday to former Israeli president Shimon Peres, offering an unprecedented military compensation package.

But beyond Iranian theocratic radicalism, Israelis do not trust John Kerry, who once called Bashar al-Assad “my dear friend.” On Sunday on “Face the Nation,” Kerry claimed with respect to “anytime, anywhere” inspections of Iranian nuclear facilities:

“This is a term that, honestly, I never heard in the four years that we were negotiating. It was not on the table. There's no such thing in arms control as anytime, anywhere.”

Kerry, however, must certainly have been aware of Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes’ interview with Jake Tapper in April  2015, during which Rhodes unequivocally stated, "under this deal, you will have anywhere, anytime 24/7 access as it relates to the nuclear facilities that Iran has." Even Secretary of Energy Ernest Muniz, who actively participated in the negotiations with Iran, acknowledged his use of the term on “Face the Nation,” shortly after Kerry’s denial.

Meanwhile, making a mockery of even “managed access,” Iran’s defense minister, Brigadier General Hossein Dehghan, declared on Monday that international inspectors will not be allowed on Iran’s military sites.

Adding to Israelis' distrust of America's secretary of state, there was Kerry’s answer to Judy Woodruff’s question on “PBS Newshour” whether Iran might transfer funds unfrozen by the deal to Hezbollah:

“Well, we’re going to clamp down. They’re not allowed to do that.”

Kerry’s response, however, flew in the face of the answer given by Susan Rice to CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, “Well, they may be able to send money, yes.”

Who is right, Kerry or Rice? In fact, they’re both wrong. Iranian Foreign Minister Zarif has now gone on record as saying the agreement with the P5+1 does not prevent Iran from sending arms to Assad and Hezbollah. Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi also stated on Tuesday, "We have told them [the P5+1 world powers] in the negotiations that we will supply arms to anyone and anywhere necessary and will import weapons from anywhere we want and we have clarified this during the negotiations."

 
Quite apart from the nuclear threat that Israelis expect to be facing from Iran, there is also the “conventional” arms threat of some 130,000 rockets and missiles already supplied by Iran to Hezbollah for use against Israel. When sanctions against Iran are removed, and Iran is again able to accelerate the flow of advanced weaponry to its proxy in Lebanon, another war Israel and Hezbollah is a near certainty. The size of New Jersey, Israel will not be able to wait out a missile onslaught of this dimension, and Israeli ground forces will be forced to enter Lebanon to quell the barrage.

Although the Obama administration appears at a loss to explain the terms of the P5+1’s agreement with Iran, we can be certain that the deal will kindle a Middle East nuclear arms race, make another round of war between Israel and Hezbollah a near certainty, and enhance Iran’s ability to make good on its threats to wipe Israel off the face of the map. Dear Congress, Israel implores you to say no to this so-called agreement, whose terms remain a mystery and source of contention.

Iran to Continue Arming Assad and Hezbollah: Kerry and Rice Misinform the American Public

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On July 17, 2015, John Kerry and Judy Woodruff had the following interchange on PBS Newshour concerning Obama's nuclear deal with Iran (my emphasis in red):

JUDY WOODRUFF: You have emphasized that this was just a deal about Iran’s nuclear program. It wasn’t intended to get at anything else.

And yet, as you know, there is concern that Iran will take some of that money that they’re going to get from the frozen assets that are now being unfrozen, that they will use it on — some of it to create mischief, more mischief in the area, give some of it to Hezbollah, some of it to the Shiite militias in Yemen and so forth.

JOHN KERRY: Right.

JUDY WOODRUFF: What is the U.S. prepared to do about that? How do you see that playing out?

JOHN KERRY: Well, we’re going to clamp down. They’re not allowed to do that.

They’re not allowed to do that, outside even of this agreement. There is a U.N. resolution that specifically applies to them not being allowed to transfer to Hezbollah. They are specifically not allowed under another U.N. resolution to transfer to the Shia militia in Iraq. They are specifically not allowed to transfer to the Houthis.

And I will be meeting with all of the Gulf states in about two weeks in Doha, and we are laying down — and Secretary Carter is meeting with them in Riyadh next week. We are laying down the steps we will take to work with our friends and allies in the region to push back against this behavior.

So, according to Kerry, Iran cannot transfer money to Hezbollah or to Houthi rebels. However, on July 15, 2015, Susan Rice gave CNN's Wolf Blitzer a completely different answer:

WOLF BLITZER: I just want to be precise. Once the money starts flowing in, it's their money, correctly - as I pointed out, as you pointed out - it's their money. They can do with it whatever they want. If they want to give a billion dollars of weapons to Bashar al-Assad or a billion dollars to Houthi rebels in Yemen . . .

SUSAN RICE: No, they can’t do that, Wolf, because they’ll still be under an arms embargo that would prevent them from sending weapons anywhere.

WOLF BLITZER: So what if they're not sending weapons, what if they're just sending money?

SUSAN RICE: Well, they may be able to send money. Yes.

Well, neither Kerry nor Rice are telling us how Iran understands it obligations under the deal. As reported by Iran's Fars News Agency:

"Renowned political analyst Dr. Mohammad Marandi said that Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif told him in Vienna last week that Iran would continue to supply arms to the regional nations even under a final nuclear deal.

'When we were in Vienna, the Arab reporters asked me if Iran would continue arms aids to its regional allies under the final deal, and when I asked Mr. Zarif, the Iranian foreign minister, the question, he told me that Iran would continue the arms supply policy,' Marandi, a Tehran University Professor, said during a live interview with the English-language channel, press tv, on Monday night.

'Mr. Zarif told me that Iran would continue its arms aid to the regional nations and he told me that it would be in violation of the UN Security Council resolution (that was adopted earlier today), but it would not be in opposition to the agreement (also known as the Comprehensive Joint Plan of Action),' he reiterated adding that Zarif had not asked him to remain unnamed when reflecting the answer to the reporters."

Care to comment, John and Susan?

John Kerry: I Never Heard the Term "Anytime, Anywhere"

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US Secretary of State John Kerry and Secretary of Energy Ernest Moniz had a remarkable interview on "Face the Nation" yesterday concerning the disastrous nuclear deal struck with Iran. As reported by CBS News:

"In an interview with CBS' "Face the Nation" that aired Sunday, Kerry argued that having 'anytime, anywhere' access to all of Iran's nuclear sites was 'not on the table' and a term 'I never heard in the four years that we were negotiating' - even though, as host John Dickerson pointed out, Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes said in April that the international community would have 'anywhere, anytime, 24/7 access.'

'This is a term that, honestly, I never heard in the four years that we were negotiating. It was not on the table. There's no such thing in arms control as anytime, anywhere. There isn't any nation in the world, none that has an anytime, anywhere,' Kerry said. 'We always were negotiating was an end to the interminable delays that people had previously.'"

Yeah, right. Kerry was unaware that in an interview with Jake Tapper on April 6, 2015, Ben Rhodes declared, "under this deal, you will have anywhere, anytime 24/7 access as it relates to the nuclear facilities that Iran has"? Even Moniz acknowledged his use of the term, albeit with qualifications, during the "Face the Nation" interview.

But more to the point, why shouldn't "anytime, anywhere" have been "on the table"? If in fact it wasn't "on the table," John ("Assad is my dear friend") Kerry doesn't have a clue how to negotiate a deal and should resign immediately.

The Reason Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif Shouted, "Never Threaten an Iranian": You Will Never Guess Why!

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Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has been having no small number of emotional outbursts in Vienna of late. He is already known to have screamed at John ("Assad is my dear friend") Kerry during a one-on-one meeting, but more recently, on Monday evening, he vented his spleen on poor EU foreign policy head Federica Mogherini and shouted:

"Never threaten an Iranian!"

Now you might think that this outburst was intended for consumption by hometown admirers of this rowdy man of action, and in part this is true; however, there is more to the story. According to my sources at Zarif's hotel, on Sunday night the head of the Iranian delegation to the talks with the P5+1 watched the movie "The Princess Bride" alone in his room. A member of the security detail posted outside his hotel room door informed me that Zarif turned up the volume to a deafening level just before the character Vizinni informed the Dread Pirate Roberts:

"Never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line!"

This was followed by orgasmic moaning and an eerie silence.

Just thought you might like to know.

The New York Times, "Talks on Iran Nuclear Deal Are Extended Once Again": A Shocking Revelation From Vienna

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And you thought that John ("Assad is a dear friend") Kerry and Wendy (the amazing social worker who aced the North Korean nuclear negotiations) Sherman have nothing new to tell us from Vienna? Guess again. In a New York Times article entitled "Talks on Iran Nuclear Deal Are Extended Once Again" by Michael R. Gordon and David E. Sanger, we learn of new developments. Observing that "A deadline is a deadline, except, it seems, at the Iran nuclear negotiations," Gordon and Sanger go on to say:

"To sustain itself during its marathon meetings, the United States negotiating team has since the beginning of June consumed at least 10 pounds of Twizzlers, 30 pounds of mixed nuts and dried fruit, 20 pounds of string cheese and more than 200 Rice Krispie Treats, according to its informal count."

Well done, Wendy! Keep at it, John! A few more Twizzlers and a few more concessions, and you might yet sow the seeds of a second Holocaust.

Kerry Falls From His Bicycle: Did the World Get a Lucky Break?

John Kerry fell from his bicycle in Paris and is headed back to the US. Will he be able to return to Geneva in time to cement the nuclear deal with Khamenei by June 30, providing the lunatic Islamic Republic of Iran with an arsenal of atomic weapons mounted on ICBMs within the coming decade, or did the world just get a lucky break?

Meanwhile, France is insisting on the right to inspect Iranian military bases for troublesome indications of forbidden atomic bomb making. In response, Ali Akbar Velayati, a top adviser to Khamenei, stated on Saturday, "France does not play any determining role on the international scene other than the harsh statements it makes through some individuals who do not feel responsible."

Not to worry, Ali Akbar: Obama will stop at nothing - even Israel's existence - to take this genocidal deal across the finish line.

New Fact Sheet Issued by Iran's Parliament: Drastic Revisions of Lausanne Statement Required

If anyone still believes that sufficient common ground was achieved in Lausanne, justifying the declaration of a framework understanding between Iran and the P5+1, he (I'm talking about you, John Kerry) should have a look at the "fact sheet" released today by the Iranian parliament. As reported by Fars News:

"The Iranian parliament's Nuclear Committee on Wednesday released a factsheet to declare the revisions needed to be made in the Lausanne statement that was issued by Tehran and the world powers as a framework understanding at the end of their nuclear talks in Switzerland earlier this month.

The factsheet which was presented by Head of the Nuclear Committee Ebrahim Karkhaneyee on Wednesday stresses the necessity for respecting the redlines and guidelines specified by Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei, making Iran's decisions and undertakings reversible to enable the country to resume its nuclear operations in case of the other side's non-commitment to its undertakings, and immediate termination of all sanctions in a single step and on the first day of the implementation of the final agreement.

The factsheet also necessitates commitment of both sides to their undertakings based on the Geneva agreement, a fair and reasonable balance between the gives and takes, taking good care not to impair the country's security and military boundaries and national interests, providing 190,000 SWUs (Separative Work Units) of nuclear fuel enrichment capability needed by Iran to produce fuel for the Bushehr nuclear power plant immediately after the end of contract with Russia, safeguarding the nuclear achievements, actual operation of all nuclear facilities of Iran not in words, but in action, continued Research and Development (R&D) works and scientific and technological progress in Iran and immediate application of R&D findings in the country's industrial-scale uranium enrichment cycle.

The factsheet urges operation of 10,000 centrifuge machines at Natanz and Fordo, a maximum 5-year-long duration for the deal and for Iran's nuclear limitations, replacement of the current centrifuges with the latest generation of home-made centrifuge machines at the end of the five-year period."

Or stated otherwise, there never was a framework understanding, and if the Lausanne statement relected any commonality whatsoever between the sides, it is now null and void.

Was the Iranian parliament responding to the bipartisan compromise reached by the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee regarding Senator Bob Corker's bill? Possibly. In any event, there is simply no way that Iran and the P5+1 are going to reach a final agreement by the end of June.

Is John Kerry to Be Awarded an Honorary Doctorate From Clown School?

You can't make this stuff up:

On Sunday, John Kerry told "Face the Nation":

"The Russians, who are not our usual allies, released a statement saying that what we have put out in terms of our information [i.e. fact sheet] is both reliable and accurate."

Well today, Kerry called Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov to complain about Moscow's decision to sell advanced S-300 air-defense systems to Iran. Lavrov is claiming that the Lausanne "framework understanding" makes the sale permissible. Kerry disagrees.

I guess that Kerry and Lavrov are not on the same page concerning the American fact sheet after all.

Moreover, you can be certain that if Iran violates a final nuclear agreement, the Russians will be there to help reinstate, i.e. "snap back" as Obama puts it, sanctions . . . not. Why won't the Russians agreen to reinstate sanctions? Because the end of sanctions is what will allow Iran to pay for its expensive new Russian air defense systems.

No, John, you're not in line for a Nobel Peace Prize; however, you just might be receiving in the mail an honorary doctorate from clown school.