President Donald Trump is following a nuclear agreement with Iran, hoping to put an end to the threat that Iran becomes a nuclear energy.
Israel’s supporters are worried, because Trump’s negotiation team, so far, has made movements similar to those performed by President Barack Obama, movements that were later seen as catastrophic errors.
Trump is betting that he can succeed where Obama failed. But there are several worrying signs.
One is that the Trump administration seems, as the Obama administration, having leaked sensitive details of the Israeli plans to attack Iran’s nuclear sites.
Obama’s goal in 2012 was to prevent Israel from doing anything to endanger a great deal with the Iranian regime. Trump’s goal in a similar leak this week to New York Times It seems to have a leg to press Iran, but Israel is, without a doubt, according to reports.
Another mistake is to suggest that Iran will simply have an enriching uranium, not destroying its nuclear program or clarifying past violations of international nuclear agreements.
That is the same formula that Obama used, and could not hold the regime.
Special envoy Steve Witkoff later rinse That they will, in fact, would have to “eliminate” its program, but stopped well or demanding total transparency.
A third repeated error is to weaken Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
Trump has not tried to humiliate Bibi, as Obama did; Or to expel him, as Biden did. However, bringing the Israeli leader to the White House earlier this month, only to surprise him with a public announcement of direct conversations between the United States and Iran, he hurt Netanyahu nationwide and made him less threatening to Iran, although he dominated.
The net effect of these errors has been to establish a situation in which the Iranians can simply choose to play over time, betting that Trump will choose to avoid war and its consequences.
Alternatively, Iran could offer an agreement that simply repeats the 2015 agreement, which did nothing to the support of Iran to terror or its internal abuse of human rights. And Trump, looking for a victory in foreign policy, could be tempted to take it.
But there are also several differences between the Trump and Obama approach.
One is that Trump, at least, is aware of the possibility that Iran can be trying to cheat him. “I think they are taking advantage of us,” he said this week.
The involvement is that Trump could soon run out of patience and resort to a military option. And while Obama said a military strike was “on the table”, nobody touched it seriously. Trump, on the other hand, is actively attacking the hutis, the representatives of Iran in Yemen, which means that Iran has reasons to fear.
Circumstances have also changed. Iran has few aerial defenses, after Israel destroyed most of them last year, in response to unprecedented ballistic missile attacks of the regime. That means that Iran has no margin of error.
And while Iran increased the enrichment under Biden (not just after Trump left the old agreement, as the Democrats have falsely affirmed), the undercover attacks of Israel in their facilities delayed Iran’s progress and aroused the regime.
No one could deny that Trump takes Iran seriously as a threat to American national security, or that he supports Israel. But there are prominent voices in Trump’s orbit, in particular, the media businessman Tucker Carlson, who have vocally opposed to military action against Iran. The scope of its influence in the White House is not clear.
One thing Trump has done well is to communicate directly with the Iranian people. He did it in his first mandate, when he called an air attack that should have reprisals for Iranian attacks against Saudi Arabia. In doing so, Trump expressed concern about civil informal ones, sending the message that he cared more Iranian than his own. He continues to speak of a brighter future of the relations between the two nations.
It may be that Trump can achieve an agreement that stops Iran’s nuclear program, avoids threatening its neighbors and creating a new internal pressure that, over time, will allow Iranians to take control of their own destiny.
But like its tariff policy, Trump’s reach to Iran is a bet.
And Israel can act on its own anyway, if you feel that Trump’s diplomacy is logging.
Netanyahu knows well that time is running out.
Joel B. Pollak is a senior editor in general in Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday In Sirius XM Patriot on Sundays at night from 7 pm to 10 pm et (4 pm at 7 pm pt). Hey is the author of The agenda: What Trump should do in its first 100 daysAvailable for pre-pedd at Amazon. He is also the author of Trump’s virtues: the lessons and legacy of the presidency of Donald TrumpNow available in audible. He is a winner of the student community of journalism Robert Novak 2018. Follow it on Twitter in @joelpollak.
