Iran’s Press TV dedicated last week’s episode of its current affairs discussion program, “The Link,” to the state of U.S.-Iranian relations. Flynt participated from Washington, along with a group of graduate students from the University of Tehran’s Faculty of World Studies in the Press TV studios in Iran. The program (please press play in the video screen above to view) provides important insights about the perceptions of educated Iranians regarding President Obama’s Iran policy and America’s ultimate intentions towards the Islamic Republic. The students’ observations provide powerful confirmation for our argument that U.S.-Iranian engagement has “failed” not because Iran is not interested in better relations but because President Obama has not shown Iranian leaders or the Iranian public that he is genuinely prepared to take American policy in a fundamentally different direction.
–Flynt Leverett and Hillary Mann Leverett
the video is actually wrong. there is no flynt leverett in it. the program is something else. you can find it on youtube. there are 6 students talking with prof. leverett.
Alan, sorry, I know, I too, share your feelings, never less it was a lost Hope from the beginning.
Cut it out Kooshy, you’re depressing me. In fact, all of you are.
Day 3
Ok, ok, you will get the kids play ground, well let me think, hum, may be on the south lawn ,and that’s our final offer, but, I have to tell you, you are a tough damn good negotiator, I am sure you are going to do just well.
Day 2 pre nomination negotiations
Ok, Ok you can have your own basketball court, fine, and yes Valerie Jarrett can also watch your hook shoot, what else do you want? Common, haven’t you heard “man’s got to know his limitations”
Eric
“Anybody that picks Dennis Ross to run his Iran portfolio and half-dead George Mitchell to run his Israel/Palestine portfolio (perhaps so that he could write Volume 2 of the Mitchell report – he just loves to write reports!) Pretty much tipped his hand a long time ago. Perhaps Obama can’t be blamed for having picked Hillary (the “Iran Obliterator”) Clinton for Secretary of State, but she’s more of the same regardless of why Obama picked her (and she encouraged him to pick Ross, after all).”
Do you want to know what concessions were made to make party bosses and Clinton’s backers agree with the first black president’s nomination, the CS, DOD, DOS, DOT, NSA, and UN, you can keep the HUD and Transportation, we will let you know about the DOI and Agriculture once we get that but don’t plan for it now in time Rahm will tell you who to pick.
James;
That was precisely what I was trying to say:
“By the way, it is interesting to know that the very people who were directly involved with the republicans to work for them against Carter during the hostage crisis”
In fact the seeds of “Irangate” were sown during the deal for hostage crisis. In my opinion, the Ronald Reagan government was one of the most corrupt governments USA ever experienced comparable, perhaps, only to G.W. Bush and the Nickson. But unfortunately, the system -or as people prefer to call the Iranian government the US “regime”- hushed it up.
James,
“Much as I wish Obama would welcome a challenge from Netanyahu, I think Obama is pretty much under the control of the Israel lobby even if he makes noises indicating to the contrary.”
Anybody that picks Dennis Ross to run his Iran portfolio and half-dead George Mitchell to run his Israel/Palestine portfolio (perhaps so that he could write Volume 2 of the Mitchell report – he just loves to write reports!) pretty much tipped his hand a long time ago. Perhaps Obama can’t be blamed for having picked Hillary (the “Iran Obliterator”) Clinton for Secretary of State, but she’s more of the same regardless of why Obama picked her (and she encouraged him to pick Ross, after all).
As my dear mother used to say, the main job of any politician (she actually used to say the “only job”) is to get re-elected.
Alan,
Much as I wish Obama would welcome a challenge from Netanyahu, I think Obama is pretty much under the control of the Israel lobby even if he makes noises indicating to the contrary.
Pirouz_2,
Interesting points! Moreover, is it not true that the hostage takers made a deal with operatives for Ronald Reagan, so that they did not conclude a deal with the Carter administration for the release of the hostages in time to help Carter avoid getting pummelled in the election on this idiotic issue?
Fiorangela,
The Saudis regard Israel’s oppression of the Palestinians as a much larger threat to the peace of the Middle East, than anything emanating from Iran. The Saudi foreign minister was in the US underlining this fact just recently. Needless to say, his comments received little attention in US newspapers, network TV news, etc.
Eric – he’s off to Palestine again, due there tomorrow I think. Netanyahu has rolled out the red carpet in time-honoured fashion by insisting there will be no halt to settlement building in East Jerusalem.
I actually now WANT Netanyahu to rile Obama; I wonder whether Obama wants it too?
By the way, it is interesting to know that the very people who were directly involved with the republicans to work for them against Carter during the hostage crisis, the people who actually went inside and took over the embassy are all in the reformist-green camp today. Two prominent names are Saeed Hajjarian and Abbas Abdi. Abdi was also the interrogator of Mr. Amir Entezam! The very same people who made under table deals with Reagan during the embassy take over (it is an amazing thing that that criminal of a president actually is being glorified in USA!), later on, under the leadership of people such as Mousavi and Karroubi, committed one of the biggest treasons against Iran during the Irangate scandal again in league with Reagan’s gang (and Israelies)!
Pretty much all of those “Irangate” guys turned into reformists later on! And all those guys are today “green”, I am truly curious to know how much their connections with their former masters (in my opinion they are still their masters!) have made the US government give such substantial support to the “greens”.
James,
Regarding the WSJ article – look at the bright side. Its mention that Dennis Ross is thought to be muscling aside George Mitchell at least implies that George Mitchell is still alive. Given the level of his activity, I’d been wondering about that.
James,
“Rybakov puts the matter neatly. One might note, however, that most Americans are too ignorant to be aware that Iran opposes nuclear weapons on religious grounds.”
Some Americans may be ignorant of Iran’s religious grounds, but even if those Americans joined the ranks of those who do understand Iran’s religious grounds, I don’t think it would count for much. After all, I think there’s a passage in the Judaeo-Christian Bible that reads: “Thou shalt not drop atomic bombs on thy neighbor” (or something like that – I can’t remember the exact words), but that obviously didn’t stop the US. While religious prohibitions may count for much more to Muslims, few if any Americans will assign much weight to those prohibitions.
Eric,
Rybakov puts the matter neatly. One might note, however, that most Americans are too ignorant to be aware that Iran opposes nuclear weapons on religious grounds.
The primary issue is adequate transparency, and how to achieve it when issues of pride are naturally present – - given the dishonesty and obvious hypocrisy of the US in its attitude toward Israel as contrast with US treatment of Iran.
Eric,
Don’t miss the article in the Wall Street Journal today, regarding the illegal Jewish settlements in East Jerusalem. Dennis Ross now calls himself Obama’s Middle East adviser, bypassing of course George Mitchell! Ross always puts the interests of the Israeli government ahead of the national interests of the American people.
Dan Cooper,
I very much agree with you that Iran would not attack Israel unless Israel attacks first. Iran would be reluctant to attack Israel in any event. There is a cultural element here: art, architecture, history, topography, not to mention millions of Muslims and Christians would be hurt in one way or another. And Ahmadinejad has made clear the Iranians are not enemies of the Israelis.
Fiorangela,
“I wonder if I will experience the same degree of welcome and friendliness toward Americans the next time I visit Iran, for the astonishing thing that Obama has accomplished is to give Iranians reason to think as unfavorably towards Americans as he allows propagandists in the US to poison Americans’ perceptions of Iran.”
I’m confident you’ll still be as well received next time. I’ve always felt welcome as a tourist, with only one minor exception: Peru in 1974, where a mixture of “Yankee, go home” and anti-Vietnam sentiment combined for an unfriendly attitude in some Peruvians – though even then it was the exception. And on my next trip to Peru, 32 years later, people were generally friendly (I guess the anti-Vietnam War component had dropped out of their thinking by then), so the reception for Americans can actually get better over time.
To “b”:
“Guess he talked to Dennis Ross?”
My suspicion exactly — though I suppose it could have been one of many others. Thank you for citing this Broder article. I think it’s especially useful for non-American readers to see what American readers are subjected to every day. And Broder is far from extreme. The lunatic (but influential) fringe in this country is to be found more on radio and Fox TV, which can reach even those Americans who are unable to read, or who can but find it too exhausting to do so — commentators like Sean Hannity, Bill O’Reilly, Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Michael Savage, and on and on, who not only convince their listeners and viewers but, as best I can tell, really believe what they say, which makes them even more convincing.
Writers like Broder do their part, of course, by tossing red meat to the others – anonymously-sourced quotations such as the one you cite. The others cite it, add that it came from a respected columnist at the respectable Washington Post, toss in a bit of their own imagination, and then count on their audience to add still more imagination until the final picture of Iran is an ugly and scary one indeed.
Note the statement by Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Rybakov, beginning with the word “but”:
“Rybakov said the international community is well aware that ‘atomic bombs are against Iran’s religious beliefs and defensive doctrine,’ but urged Iran to resolve the current stand-off in a way ‘that may be considered satisfactory to the US and some other countries’ so that “full confidence in the exclusively peaceful nature of the Iranian nuclear programme [is achieved].’”
kooshy
excellent report by ERIC WALBERG
“If the US claim of fighting the spread of nuclear weapons is not a lie, how can the Zionist regime manage to avoid international regulations?”
Since there was not any real discussion of last week Tehran Disarmament Conference in Race for Iran, I thought I post this entire report which originally was printed in Al Ahram in Egypt.
Iran’s Disarmament Conference
By ERIC WALBERG
The logic of power is still the overriding the power of logic, quipped the head of Iran’s Atomic Organization Ali Salehi at the “Nuclear Energy for all, Nuclear Weapons for None” disarmament conference in Tehran last weekend, referring to US foreign policy, in particular, nuclear. Taking this elegant formulation a step further, President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says nuclear-armed states such as the United States should be removed entirely from the IAEA and its Board of Governors. Iran’s president called for the formation of a new international body to oversee nuclear disarmament, or at least the reinvigoration of the Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT).
Twenty-four foreign and deputy foreign ministers and official representatives from 60 states, including China, Russia, Pakistan, India, Iraq, and Turkey came to Teheran, with the glaring exception of the US and Israel, though they were invited along with everyone else. The conference was a direct reply to Washington’s refusal to invite Iran to its own Nuclear Security Summit last week, which attracted the attention of 47 leaders, and focused — more cynically — merely on international control of all nuclear-related activity.
Obama’s conference was limited to efforts to protect weapon-usable nuclear materials (notably spent fuel from Ukraine) to safeguard against nuclear terrorism, and endorsed Obama’s call for securing all nuclear materials around the globe within four years to keep them out of the grasp of terrorists.
This is an echo of the 1946 Baruch Plan by the US to force a prostrate world into accepting US control of nuclear power/ weapons. A threadbare demand by the only country which has actually used nuclear weapons in battle — against innocent civilians. Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei said, “The one and only nuclear criminal in the world now falsely claims to be fighting against the spread of atomic weapons but has definitely not taken and will not take any serious action in this regard.”
This counter-conference was a coup for Iran — a truly international platform for challenging Washington’s assertion that it wants to see a world without nuclear weapons. “The conference expressed its concerns about the continued existence of Weapons of Mass Destruction — nuclear arms in particular — as well as their application or threat to apply them,” the closing statement said.
Iran’s Joint Armed Forces Chief of Staff Hassan Firouzabadi said the Washington summit actually worked against the purpose of non-proliferation: “Its result was that nuclear weapons should be safeguarded and this was in conflict with the NPT and disarmament.” He pointed out the hypocrisy of Washington’s Nuclear Posture Review which claims it does not seek first use of nuclear weapons — except against Iran and North Korea, asking sarcastically what makes Iranian and North Korean citizens different from the rest of the world. Iran’s UN ambassador Mohammad Khazaee dotted the “i”s, calling Washington’s new nuclear weapons policy “state terrorism”.
Salehi led the criticism of the NPT where “in the past 40 years most of the activities have been focusing on the non-proliferation and then on the peaceful use of nuclear energy and not on the disarmament. So, we have not seen any positive or hopeful steps in the disarmament issue.” He complained that there is no “watchdog for the disarmament. We want to have specific date, specific date, announced for the complete disarmament of the countries that have nuclear weapons. We are after the power of logic but unfortunately still the rule of jungle is prevailing.”
Iran’s top nuclear negotiator Saeed Jalili said, “In order to achieve disarmament and non-proliferation, we must promote the NPT and prevent powers from exerting their influence on the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).” Iran’s top envoy to the IAEA, Ali Asghar Soltanieh, noted that the conference will play a significant role in the outcome of next month’s NPT conference in New York.
Iran’s call for real nuclear disarmament is supported, oddly enough, by Germany, which called for the removal of all US nuclear weapons from Europe last year. The removal of all nuclear weapons from the Middle East, of course, was on all participants’ minds. All agreed that Israel must be pressured to join the NPT, completing the work that Obama’s conference should have done. There, only Turkish Prime Minister Recep Erdogan and Egypt’s Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit dared raise the issue of Israeli nuclear weapons.
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Rybakov told the Iranian conference, “We need to achieve the goal of the establishment of a zone free from weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East and here Israel’s role is crucial. Without their due involvement, nothing would be possible.” Ayatollah Khamenei was less restrained: “If the US claim of fighting the spread of nuclear weapons is not a lie, how can the Zionist regime manage to avoid international regulations — in particular the NPT — and turn occupied Palestine into an arsenal of nuclear weapons?”
Foreign ministers from Iraq, Syria, and Lebanon supported the Organisation of Islamic Conference head, Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, in calling for a nuclear weapon-free Middle East. Their presence no doubt irked Washington, as did Turkey’s role in both conferences. As a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council, member of the Non-Aligned Movement and NATO, EU candidate, and Iran’s Muslim neighbour, Turkey has suddenly emerged from its US shadow as an important regional mediator.
In a jab to Washington for spurning the conference, Rybakov effused: “It is an excellent opportunity to have a free-flowing exchange of views on some critical issues. We are discussing the way to go forward to this [nuclear weapon-free] goal.”
On Iran’s nuclear programme, delegations from Turkey, Syria, Lebanon and Iraq voiced their support for Iranian nuclear activities, which they described as peaceful. Rybakov said the international community is well aware that “atomic bombs are against Iran’s religious beliefs and defensive doctrine,” but urged Iran to resolve the current stand-off in a way “that may be considered satisfactory to the US and some other countries” so that “full confidence in the exclusively peaceful nature of the Iranian nuclear programme.” Paul Ingram, executive director of the British American Security Information Council, said “The Tehran conference will undermine US strategies in forming a front against Iran.”
This counter-conference highlighted the real reason for targeting Iran: more than any other country, it exposes Washington’s real agenda, its imperial agenda. As if responding to the conference’s success, a secret memo penned by Defence Secretary and well-known peacenik Robert Gates in January was leaked as the conference closed, calling for new options against Iran including invasion, Bush’s tired policy of “leaving all the options on the table”.
But like the US conference, much of the real activity was going on behind the scenes, and it was not all nuclear. Pakistan and China were low-key, but nonetheless their presence was a snub to Washington. Iran is China’s key energy partner, importing 12 per cent of its oil from Iran, and is busy helping build the Peace Pipeline to carry Iran’s natural gas to Pakistan (and in the future to India and China), despite US attempts to force Pakistan to cancel the project and cooperate on a pipeline through Afghanistan to Central Asia. India and Iran are jointly construct power plants and plan to exchange electricity via Pakistan. Tehran is already exporting electricity to Turkey, Armenia and Afghanistan. With Iraq’s oil industry in disarray, and as Iran’s nuclear power plants begin work in August, Iran is poised to become the energy powerhouse in Central Asia.
That, along with the likes of Iran’s disarmament conference, is doing much more for regional peace than US invasions and threats. Such nuclear-armed countries as India and Pakistan would be happy to give up their nukes if everyone else did, making them natural allies of Iran — and the world at large. Actions speak much louder than words in politics, and Iran’s current diplomatic and economic demarche is showing up the empty White House rhetoric at each turn.
Eric Walberg writes for Al-Ahram Weekly. You can reach him at http://ericwalberg.com/
David Broder in his WaPo column: The rewards — and limits — of Obama’s patience
/quote/
In truth, I had heard another senior administration official, dining with a small group of reporters two weeks ago, say that in his judgment, within a year to 18 months, after the diplomats have played out their hands at the United Nations, we will face a showdown with Iran.
/endquote/
Guess he talked to Dennis Ross?
“Iran’s efforts in Palestine are not appreciated, and that Palestinians would prefer to fight their own battles and achieve their own liberation”
With what? Rocks, versus Merkava main battle tanks, AH-64 Pethen (US: Apache) attack helicopters and F-16 Sufas (US: Fighting Falcon) strike fighters?
Perhaps the cowardly doctor would like to ask the brave young Palestinians throwing the rocks at their oppressors how they would like to fight their battles?
Fiorangela Leone
The article by Iranian-Canadian is full of garbage.
One of the students followed up on Flynt’s statement that the conflict between US and Iran is really more about tensions between Iran and US allies, Israel and Saudi Arabia.
With respect to Israel, the student noted that Israel targets Iran because Iran supports Palestinians in their struggle against Israeli aggression.
Izzeldin Abu Laish, the Palestinian physician and peace activist whose daughters were killed by IDF in Gaza even as Izzeldin was at work in Israel, says that Iran’s efforts in Palestine are not appreciated, and that Palestinians would prefer to fight their own battles and achieve their own liberation — a sentiment similar to Iranians who prefer to reform their government to their own standards and timeline.
This article by an Iranian-Canadian, presents an interesting perspective on Iran’s involvement in Palestine. http://www.iranian.com/main/2010/apr/palestinians-kiss-death
Why Iran Won’t Attack Israel
The Jewish state’s substantial Palestinian population — serves as a deterrent.
No nuclear attack on Israel could happen without the deaths of countless Palestinians and Israelis, not to mention the likely destruction of Jerusalem, the third holiest site in Islam.
The reality of Palestinian casualties, the destruction of Jerusalem, the onset of regional war and the immediate destruction of Iran’s regime as a result of a multilateral conventional or even nuclear counterattack all serve as a credible deterrent to a nuclear Iran. The Iranian leadership has shown a demonstrable interest in self-preservation.
Israel constantly needs an enemy that it says threatens its existence.
Otherwise the Jewish state would have a harder time maintaining its overwhelming military supremacy in the region and continuously changing the subject from resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to practically anything else.
The ideology at the foundation of the state of Israel and the very justification for its existence requires the existence of apocalyptic anti-Semitic forces with the intent and capability to annihilate.
Without these boogeymen, whether it is Saddam Hussein, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or Arabs who “want to push Israel into the sea,” the state of Israel ceases to have any justification for the maintenance of a Jewish majority by force or for its ongoing occupation of Palestinian lands.
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article25282.htm
More Hype About Iran?
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article25279.htm
One of the more remarkable features about the endless drumbeat of alarm about Iran is that it pays virtually no attention to Iran’s actual capabilities, and rests on all sorts of worst case assumptions about Iranian behavior.
Consider the following facts, most of them courtesy of the 2010 edition of The Military Balance, published annually by the prestigious International Institute for Strategic Studies in London:
GDP: United States — 13.8 trillion
Iran –$ 359 billion (U.S. GDP is roughly 38 times greater than Iran’s)
Defense spending (2008):
U.S. — $692 billion
Iran — $9.6 billion (U.S. defense budget is over 70 times larger than Iran)
Military personnel:
U.S.–1,580,255 active; 864,547 reserves (very well trained)
Iran– 525,000 active; 350,000 reserves (poorly trained)
Combat aircraft:
U.S. — 4,090 (includes USAF, USN, USMC and reserves)
Iran — 312 (serviceability questionable)
Main battle tanks:
U.S. — 6,251 (Army + Marine Corps)
Iran — 1,613 (serviceability questionable)
Navy:
U.S. — 11 aircraft carriers, 99 principal surface combatants, 71 submarines, 160 patrol boats, plus large auxiliary fleet
Iran — 6 principal surface combatants, 10 submarines, 146 patrol boats
Nuclear weapons:
U.S. — 2,702 deployed, >6,000 in reserve
Iran — Zero
What it does mean is that we ought to keep this relatively minor “threat” in perspective, and not allow the usual threat-inflators to stampede us into another unnecessary war.
My impression is that Admiral Mullen and SecDef Gates understand this.
I hope I’m right. But I’m still puzzled as to why the Obama administration hasn’t tried the one strategy that might actually get somewhere:
Take the threat of force off the table, tell Tehran that we are willing to talk seriously about the issues that bother them (as well as the items that bother us), and try to cut a deal whereby Iran ratifies and implements the NPT Additional Protocol and is then permitted to enrich uranium for legitimate purposes (but not to weapons-grade levels). It might not work, of course, but neither will our present course of action or the “last resort” that Mullen referred to last weekend.
David,
Great post. The stunning stupidity of the American media after the takeover of the US embassy in Tehran, helped create a disaster for Carter and for the US too.
Interesting program. Obama’s failure to mention Iran’s history, culture and art in his 2010 message to Iran, is regrettable.
Clearly, the Israel lobby is doing a good job of controlling the perception of the American public, who of course remain remarkably ignorant about Iran, the Middle East, etc.
Thanks Eric, frankly your Antwerp station link was more enjoyable.
Cheers, and I mean Sonoma Cheers
Eric – thanks for the link to the Antwerp airport happening. It reminded me that an tour group that I had hoped to join, would be returning from Tehran by way of Europe in the midst of the volcanic cloud disruptions. I’m wondering how the group has fared. I imagined group members scrambling to extend their visas in Iran; I had that experience (my visa was 6 hours short so my tour organizer insisted I apply for an extension, a process that took about 14 hours. I thought is was silly — what’s the worst that could happen if my visa expired prematurely — Iran would throw me out of the country!)
I had those thoughts in mind as I watched the Tehran University students discuss Obama’s NowRooz messages to Iran. Flynt mentioned forthrightly that the perception of Iran amongst Americans is quite negative. Yet, as one of the students said, American tourists in Iran have always been treated very well, and that was certainly my experience. But the Tehran students seemed to project a cooling in their assessment of Americans. I wonder if I will experience the same degree of welcome and friendliness toward Americans the next time I visit Iran, for the astonishing thing that Obama has accomplished is to give Iranians reason to think as unfavorably towards Americans as he allows propagandists in the US to poison Americans’ perceptions of Iran. Heckuva job, Obama.
Kooshy,
Interesting article. Thank you for the link.
Hakimeh,
I read the abstract you linked, and did not see any mention of the US presidential race in it. The Iran hostage crisis was actually a somewhat contrived device of mainstream TV networks to increase news show viewership. It was Roone Arledge, president of ABC News who coined the phrase “America Held Hostage”, and used the same techniques of sports broadcasting, where he first made his reputation, to rocket ABC news to the leader among the 3 major networks of the time. Arledge denied his sensationalist coverage of the Iranian hostage story was intended to humiliate Pres Carter and help Ronald Reagan win the presidency, but it did just that, intended or not. The american people were bombarded by competing news divisions of the 3 big networks with the most sensationalist stories they could come up with, true or not, and all of them unbalanced. Afterall, they were reporting a “sporting event”, and cheering for the hometeam. Yellow Ribbons started with the hostage incident, and are still with us in other jihgoist campaigns on other issues. The beginnings of political bombast as style of broadcasting began with Arledge’s treatment of the ‘crisis’, and led directly to the creation of the cable news netowrks.
Would you be able to watch such a program on CNN?
The Iranian Enigma
Patrick Seale
http://www.middle-east-online.com/english/opinion/?id=38499
“Iran is a vibrant democracy in the making. Even under the rule of the Mullahs, it is one of the most open, modernized and integrated countries in the Middle East. Literacy has spread rapidly in the rural areas. Every village, however remote, is linked to a road — which is more than can be said for some Arab states. Women may wear the chador, but they are a dynamic force in society. Over 60 per cent of university students are women, notes Patrick Seale.”
Thank you very much for posting the program. Very interesting. One question remains: why does the hostage crisis still color Americans’ perception of the Islamic Republic? Isn’t it related to the Islamophobic, opinionated representation of the situation for 444 days in the American mainstream media? I want to suggest that one Iranian grievance against the United States that is seldom mentioned is Iran’s representation in United States’ mainstream media, which feeds from the U.S. government’s official framing of events related to Iran. The following article specifically deals with the coverage of the hostage crisis http://dukespace.lib.duke.edu/dspace/handle/10161/838 as does Edward Said’s extensive look at the issue in his book Covering Islam.