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Friday, February 11, 2022

02/11 Links Pt1: MK Mansour Abbas: Israel is not an apartheid state; Glick: The ayatollahs' men in Washington; Biden Appointed Palestinian Government Lobbyist To Steer Mideast Aid Strategy

From Ian:

MK Mansour Abbas: Israel is not an apartheid state
Ra'am Party leader MK Mansour Abbas rejected the claim that the state of Israel was guilty of the crime of apartheid within its sovereign borders.

"I would not call it apartheid," he said during a virtual talk he gave at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy on Thursday.

He pointed out the obvious, that he led an Israeli-Arab party that was a member of the government's coalition.

"I am within the coalition," he said, adding that the option exists for Israeli-Arabs to also be ministers in the government.

He was quizzed about the issue during his talk, in light of Amnesty International's report last month which accused Israel of the crime of apartheid both within sovereign Israel and within the West Bank and Gaza. Human Rights Watch and the Israeli NGO B'Tselem have made similar claims.

Abbas was asked if he felt the term apartheid aptly described the relationship between Arabs and Jews within sovereign Israel.

Mansour said that the was not a fan of exploring the situation from the broad macro level such as apartheid or racism, but preferred instead to take a hands-on approach to solve discrimination at the micro-level.

Such accusations, he said, do not help resolve the issues.


Caroline Glick: The ayatollahs' men in Washington
Former Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif recently co-authored a book in Farsi about the 2015 nuclear deal that tells us a great deal about how we should be assessing the nuclear negotiations taking place in Vienna between Iran and the P5+1 (the US, Russia, China, France, Germany and France). Titled, "The Nuclear Deal: The Untold Story of the JCPOA, Projecting Iran's Security, Rights and Development," the book sheds light on a critical question. How did the US come to accept Iran's negotiating terms on all the major issues despite bipartisan opposition to Iran's illicit nuclear program?

Iranian human rights activist Heshmat Alavi translated the relevant portion of Zarif's memoir on his Twitter account. Zarif wrote that in 2014, the regime decided to send a copy of their draft agreement to the other negotiating teams through "an individual in contact with the US delegation and an active International Crisis Group (ICG) member."

"The goal," Zarif explained, "was to pave the path for lobbying for our draft agreement."

Zarif wrote that the highly secretive move produced the desired result. After the ICG's Iran desk officer Ali Vaez received Iran's draft agreement, the ICG published its own policy paper, which he authored that reflected the contents of the Iranian draft. Vaez's paper, "Iran and the P5+1: Solving the Nuclear Rubik's Cube," was embraced by Americans and became the basis for the 2015 nuclear deal.

Until 2014, Vaez's boss was Robert Malley, who joined the Obama administration that year after serving as the ICG's Program Director for the Middle East and North Africa. Shortly after joining the Obama administration as Special Assistant to the President and the White House Coordinator for the Middle East, North Africa and the Gulf Region, Malley became a leading member of the US negotiating team with Iran.

In 2017, Malley returned to the ICG as its head of policy and later became its president. Malley left the ICG again in 2021 when President Joe Biden appointed him to serve as his envoy for talks with Iran.

As Alavi noted, the ICG denies that it served as a lobbyist and effectively as a proxy of Iran, presenting Iran's draft agreement as its own. True or not, both Malley's and Vaez's records indicate that even if they didn't launder Iran's draft agreement to sell it to the Obama team, they have long been champions of the Iranian regime and apologists for its terror proxies. Both men support the full removal of nuclear sanctions on Iran. Last October, when Iran was still refusing to renew nuclear talks after the change of government in Tehran, and so signaled Washington that it would accept no meaningful restraints on its nuclear program, Malley said, "We are prepared to remove all of the sanctions that were imposed by the Trump administration."

Vaez, for his part, has defended Iran's nuclear program, attacked sanctions, and defended Iran's missile program, among other things. He has praised the current government, led by Ebrahim Raisi, known as "the butcher of Tehran" for his central role in the mass murder of tens of thousands of dissidents in the 1980s.
Melanie Phillips: How America is helping Iran get a nuclear arsenal
It’s hard to imagine that the Biden administration can be so stupid. What’s more likely is that — astonishingly — it is either indifferent to Iran getting the bomb or even actually wants it to do so.

After all, the administration is stuffed with people who are the enemies of Israel and the west. President Joe Biden’s envoy to Iran, Robert Malley, whitewashed Yasser Arafat’s duplicity at Camp David and has a long track record of sympathy for the Iranian regime and animus towards Israel.

And since it gained power, the administration has been pivoting away from its allies in the Gulf towards their Iranian foe. This near-incomprehensible position was explained last year in a devastating and authoritative piece in Tablet by Michael Doran and Tony Badran.

The appeasement of Iran, they wrote, could be described as the third and final stage of former President Barack Obama’s hitherto unfinished policy. This had sought to achieve a new Middle East order which relied on partnership with Iran.

The aim was for America to withdraw from engagement in the Middle East. To enable that to happen, there had to be a new equilibrium between states to achieve a balance of power. The authors called this policy the “Realignment”.

It’s not too fanciful to see this as Obama’s strategy, since Biden has remained close to him while key Biden staffers, such as Malley, are even closer.

With signs that the United States might be about to cave in completely to Iran and close a renewed nuclear deal, several US lawmakers have become increasingly alarmed and outspoken. Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, last week argued for an hour on the floor of the Senate against reviving the deal.

Yet in stark contrast to the ferocious public opposition to the 2015 deal voiced by Israel’s former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, there has been almost total silence from Israel’s current Prime Minister Naftali Bennett.

Last weekend, in what’s been described as a friendly phone call between Bennett and Biden, Bennett reportedly expressed disagreement with America’s Iran policy.

It seems that he wants to keep Biden sweet by keeping such a disagreement private. But without public pressure from the world becoming aware of America’s treacherous perfidy over Iran, which is endangering not just Israel but America itself, it will be far easier for the Biden administration to flick away Israel’s profound and all-too-real concerns.

After all, how can sober realists like Menendez gain any traction if Israel itself remains silent?

And meanwhile, as the US advertises to the world its terrible weakness, Russia and China are watching, and making their plans.


The Middle East: The US Is All In or All Out
Despite multiple attacks on Abu Dhabi, which include an air base that hosts American military personnel, the current American administration seems unwilling to designate the Houthis as the terrorist organization it is. At the same time, however, it wants to put constraints on the use of weapons the U.S. might sell to the United Arab Emirates, whose civilian population has been targeted by the Houthis... For Yemen, this is no longer acceptable.

While the Biden administration has made clear its desire to restart nuclear talks with Iran, why not try doing it from a position of strength, for instance deterrence? One of the pillars of strength would be presenting a united front against Iran, with our Gulf allies and Israel at its core. Iran recognizes and responds to strength. It also recognizes weakness and responds by taking advantage of it.

It is vitally important the Biden administration stabilize relationships with key U.S. allies in the Middle East before Iran and Russia destabilize them, or it will justly receive the blame for the chaos that will ensue. The Middle East is one area where the U.S. is a dominant power-influencer, and we must make clear to our friends that we will stand by them and to our enemies that they are endangering only themselves.

We are seeing our adversaries exploiting perceived U.S. weakness and lack of resolve in other parts of the world. We cannot let that happen in the Middle East. We must have a long-term, strategic plan that does not rely on hope but instead on determination and strength. Let us go all-in: anything less will be perceived as not being in at all.
Israel won't build settlements that'll prevent two-states - Lapid
Israel won’t engage in settlement activity that would harm the two-state solution, Foreign Minister Yair Lapid said as the state has advanced plans to authorize a yeshiva on the West Bank Evyatar hilltop over 26 km. beyond the pre-1967 lines.

“This government has made a policy of do no harm,” Lapid said in a response to a question about settlements posed to him during a joint press conference in Jerusalem on Thursday with his German counterpart Annalena Baerbock.

When it comes to the settlements, Lapid said, homes “will be built according to natural growth in the existing settlements.”

He added that “we are not going to build anything that will prevent the possibility of a future two-state solution.”

He spoke as Prime Minister Naftali Bennett’s government is under pressure from the Right and the settlement movement to uphold the Evyatar deal arranged on its behalf by the cabinet secretary and Defense Minister Benny Gantz (Blue and White).

The deal was arrived at in late June when the government was in its infancy, agreed to the authorization of both a yeshiva and a new community at Evyatar, in exchange for the voluntary evacuation of 50 families from that hilltop until the bureaucratic steps had been completed.

Lapid, along with the coalition’s Meretz party, have opposed the deal.

In the Knesset on Monday, Lapid said that the Evyatar “agreement was not made with me. I represent half of the government and therefore in my eyes it is not valid and I oppose it.”
Biden Admin Appointed Palestinian Government Lobbyist To Steer Mideast Foreign Aid Strategy
The Palestine Monetary Authority is a government agency under the Palestinian Authority, the West Bank government controlled by Fatah leader Mahmoud Abbas. Critics have accused the government of mishandling foreign aid in the past, including using it for "pay-for-slay" salaries to convicted terrorists and their families.

Salem first registered as a foreign agent for the Palestine Monetary Authority in 2015. He said he would "assist the Palestine Monetary Authority with compliance with anti-money laundering and economic sanctions laws and regulations, and to strengthen the relationship between the Palestine Monetary Authority and the U.S. Government and U.S. correspondent banks," according to Foreign Agent Registration Act records. At the time, he was also registered as a lobbyist for Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

Salem's fee for Palestine Monetary Authority work was listed as $7,500 per month in 2015 and $8,500 in 2016. The authority paid Salem around $93,000 in 2021 and $70,000 in 2020, according to the records.

Prior to the lobbying work, Salem gained notoriety as a lawyer for the Holy Land Foundation, a charity that was shut down by the U.S. government in 2001 for funding Hamas.

Salem defended the organization against a civil lawsuit brought by the family of a 17-year-old American who was killed by Hamas, in which he argued that "if this case were allowed to its logical conclusion, legitimate U.S.A. charities could be held liable for unrelated acts by individuals not connected to their charities." Salem withdrew as counsel in August 2002. The family of the victim was eventually awarded $156 million in the case.

Five of the Holy Land Foundation's leaders were later convicted in a separate criminal trial of funneling $12 million to Hamas. They were sentenced in 2009 to between 15 years and 65 years.
How Marie Newman’s Ethics Scandal Put Her in Bed With a Terrorist Sympathizer
Democratic congresswoman Marie Newman's (Ill.) decision to bribe a local Palestinian activist out of her 2020 primary race hasn't just led to ethics issues—it also put a terrorist sympathizer in charge of her campaign's foreign policy.

Last June, Newman began paying Palestinian activist and Columbia College Chicago adjunct professor Iymen Chehade roughly $10,000 a month as her campaign's "director of foreign policy and research," financial disclosures show. The hire came about a year and a half after Newman promised Chehade a six-figure job to keep him out of her competitive primary race, a bribe that sparked an ongoing ethics investigation.

Years before he joined Newman's campaign, Chehade helped facilitate a 2015 panel that brought Rasmea Odeh to campus through his position as faculty adviser for his college's Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) chapter. A convicted terrorist, Odeh was sentenced to life in prison for her role in a 1969 bombing that killed two college students in Jerusalem—but Chehade praised her as "extraordinary" in a now-deleted tweet.

Chehade's employment in Newman's campaign in a crucial foreign policy role has sparked bipartisan backlash as she faces a difficult primary fight against fellow Illinois Democratic representative Sean Casten. Pro-Israel Democrats have already mobilized to oppose Newman in the race—Democratic Majority for Israel (DMFI), for example, endorsed Casten in January, with the group's founder later lamenting that Newman is "worse than we thought."

"It's alarming that Mr. Chehade would praise or even associate with Rasmea Odeh, a terrorist convicted of two bombings that killed two college students and injured others," DMFI spokeswoman Rachel Rosen told the Washington Free Beacon. "That Mr. Chehade would hold her up as a role model on a college campus is depraved."
In new book, Trump’s Israel envoy hammers four rocky years into smooth path to peace
It was less than three months into David Friedman’s tenure as US ambassador to Israel, and he was already thinking big — about using his position to transform the Middle East.

He shared his plan with then-US president Donald Trump during a brief visit back to Washington in July 2017: “I want to move the goalposts back to where they belong with regard to the conflict and work with [senior White House adviser] Jared [Kushner] to perhaps make peace from the outside in — beginning with Israel’s natural allies. While the Palestinians are dysfunctional, there are Arab neighbors that may be ready to normalize with Israel.”

“Okay, go for it then. Good luck,” Trump replied, and with that Friedman returned to Israel and got to work, playing a central role in the president’s subsequent decisions to recognize Jerusalem as Israel’s capital and move the US embassy there, recognize Israeli sovereignty over the Golan Heights and introduce an Israeli-Palestinian peace plan. All of these steps helped lead the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco to agree to normalize ties with Israel in Trump-brokered agreements known as the Abraham Accords.

That’s the narrative Friedman builds in his new memoir “Sledgehammer,” (Broadside Books) which hit the shelves on Tuesday. But it’s one that contradicts other firsthand accounts and reporting on the formation of the Abraham Accords, which recall them as a last-minute change of course by the Trump administration after its controversial peace plan led then-Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu to declare that he had US backing to immediately begin annexing large parts of the West Bank.

Netanyahu’s announcement sparked furious reactions from across the Arab world. Fortunately for the Trump administration, it also gave Abu Dhabi the needed space to offer normalization in exchange for halting the annexation plan.

In Friedman’s telling, though, the accords were less a lucky break than a natural outgrowth of his years as Trump’s man in Tel Aviv and then Jerusalem. He succinctly explains how each accomplishment led to the next, thanks to his no-nonsense approach, which viewed the State Department he worked under as the heart of the “Deep State,” the Palestinian Authority as inept and full of empty threats, and the Arab world as a unit that “instinctively gauge[s] the strength of their opponents.”
The Israel Guys: REVEALED: David Friedman’s Inside Scoop on Trump’s Israel Policy
Today’s program is two parts: part 1 deals with three terrorists who were eliminated by the IDF in Nablus (biblical Shechem) this week, and the unsurprising headlines that appeared in the media as a response.

Part 2 deals with Former US Ambassador to Israel David Friedman’s new book entitled Sledgehammer: How Breaking with the Past Brought Peace to the Middle East. In his book, Friedman gives an inside look on the policies that were being enacted in the White House during Trump’s term in office.

If you watched our program about several of President Trump’s bombshell comments about Israel a few months ago, today’s video may shed more light on that story as well as Trump’s real attitude toward Israel.


Israeli Navy officer to be permanently stationed in Bahrain - report
An Israeli Navy officer will be permanently stationed in Bahrain, Channel 13 reported on Thursday evening.

The senior navy officer, who is expected to arrive in the Gulf state over the next few weeks, will be entrusted with maintaining communications with the US Navy's 5th fleet, which is based in Bahrain.

The move was agreed upon during Defense Minister Benny Gantz's trip to Bahrain last week, during which he visited the 5th fleet in a trilateral meeting with his Bahraini counterpart and US 5th fleet Commander Vice Admiral Brad Cooper.

In his Bahrain visit, Gantz welcomed the “long-standing partnership” between the US Navy and Israel, adding that “deepening cooperation will help defend against the common enemy of Israel, the United States and Bahrain” who have common interests and shared values.

The Abraham Accords and Israel’s move to CENTCOM show the work with the 5th fleet has increased and is reflected in what the defense minister called a "significant" visit.


Ruthie Blum: Bankrolling terrorism and moral equivalence - opinion
If Bennett hadn’t been so bent on taking credit for the Trump-brokered normalization agreements that former Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu signed with the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and other Arab states, he might have set Biden straight.

He could have reminded the president that the Palestinians oppose the Abraham Accords, and that Israel’s freedom and prosperity are a function of a flourishing democracy that the PA would like to eliminate. As well, he should have informed Biden that Abbas clearly isn’t interested in prosperity for his people, as he keeps spending donors’ dollars, euros and shekels on rewarding the murder of Jews.

The families of the three terrorists killed on Tuesday by Israeli forces will be handsomely paid monthly stipends from now on, especially since they were members of a cell affiliated with the Al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, which is tied to Abbas’s Fatah faction.


Though the terrorists were behind a recent spate of shooting attacks against Israeli soldiers and civilians, Fatah spokesman Munir al-Jaghoub referred to the operation in which they were taken down as “a criminal assassination… [that’s] part of [Israel’s] ongoing crimes.”

According to Jerusalem Post correspondent Khaled Abu Toameh, the incident also apparently led to the Palestinian Central Council announcement on Wednesday that it had “affirmed the termination of the obligations of the PLO and the PA toward all agreements with the occupying state, [including] the suspension of recognition of the State of Israel until it recognizes the State of Palestine on the borders of June 4, 1967, with east Jerusalem as its capital… [and the] halting of all forms of security coordination.”

Additionally, the Council rejected all of Israel’s economic overtures and confidence-building measures as an alternative to a permanent and just peace. Translated from PA-euphemese, this means that Biden, Blinken and Bennett have to cough up more cash and concessions in exchange for nothing. How’s that for moral equivalence?


The Caroline Glick Show: Ep38 – Israel’s Deep State is Exposed
Feb. 7, Israelis awoke to the headline that the police used counterterror spyware to illegally penetrate the smartphones of then Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s sons and advisors. They also penetrated mobile phones belonging to senior public officials, journalists, mayors, and businessmen, none of whom were suspected of committing serious crimes. In this week’s episode Caroline and Gadi discussed the new revelations, their legal status, impact on Netanyahu’s ongoing trial, Israeli politics and society. These are tough times for Israel’s deep state but this may be the first glimpse of light at the end of the tunnel in the Israeli public’s struggle with its anti-democratic legal fraternity and deep state.




Turkey, Israel foil Iranian assassination attempt on Israeli businessman - report
Turkish and Israeli intelligence forces came together to foil an assassination attempt of Israeli businessman Yair Geller, according to Turkish media.

The alleged assassination attempt, which in this case included a team of nine, is in response to the killing of Iranian nuclear scientist Mohsen Fakhrizadeh in 2020, which Iran has attributed to Israel, according to Turkish and Israeli media reports. It is unclear what Geller's connection is.

"I am an Israeli businessman in Turkey with an engineering research and development company. I was informed that the Iranians are tracking and are attempting to assassinate me," Geller told KAN in the first response to Israeli media on the story.

His company, CNC İleri Teknoloji, a metal machinery supplier for the automotive, aerospace and medical industries, is based in Istanbul.

The Iranian cell tracked Geller and took photos of him in his home. Turkish intelligence was aware of the tracking movements done by the Iranian cell and reportedly shared the information with the Mossad once the activity neared operational status.

The cell was reportedly run by Yassin Tahermkandi, 53, an Iran-based intelligence officer, and Saleh Mushtag Bhighus, 44, his Turkish counterpart. Bhighus was among the eight arrested.
Reports: Iranian Cell Plotted to Kill Israeli in Turkey



Russia cites ‘deep concern’ over ongoing Israeli strikes in Syria
Russia has expressed “deep concern” over Israel’s ongoing strikes in Syrian territory, saying they could escalate tensions in the area and endanger commercial flights.

“Israel’s continuing strikes against targets inside Syria cause deep concern,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Thursday, according to the TASS news agency. “They are a crude violation of Syria’s sovereignty and may trigger a sharp escalation of tensions. Also, such actions pose serious risks to international passenger flights.”

She added that Moscow “systematically and resolutely opposes attempts to turn Syria into a scene of armed confrontation between third countries.”

“Once again we are insistently calling upon the Israeli side to refrain from such use of force,” she said.

The IDF has conducted hundreds of airstrikes in Syria over the past decade in response to efforts by Iran to establish a front against Israel there and to transfer weapons through the country to its proxies in the region, particularly the Lebanese Hezbollah terrorist militia.

Israel has acknowledged that it targets the bases of Iranian forces and Iran-allied terror groups, particularly along the Golan border, such as Lebanon’s Hezbollah, which has fighters deployed in southern Syria. It says it also attacks arms shipments believed to be bound for those groups.

The latest reports of Israeli airstrikes on Syria came on Monday, when Syrian state TV said jets carried out airstrikes against targets near the Syrian capital of Damascus.


Biden Pays Army Salaries to Iranian Ally
The administration and its supporters among Lebanon-affiliated advocates, think-tankers, and consultants have been discussing and advocating various scenarios for such cash injections. One scheme reportedly under consideration involved disbursing monthly stipends through a U.N.-managed fund totaling, in a remarkable coincidence, roughly the same amount of $86 million a year.

For now, the administration appears to have settled on stretching “military financing” well beyond its statutory definition so as to use it for whatever the White House and State Department desire, with no regard to whether such use is intended by Congress. Language like “livelihood support” belongs in programs like the U.S. Agency for International Development, not FMF or even INCLE, which are meant to fund equipment and training. By blurring this line, the administration has created a dangerous precedent that will invite abuse.

Still more remarkable is the administration’s decision to establish this globally significant precedent in, of all places, Lebanon—where the financial system is soaked in Hezbollah money laundering and financial crimes, and just about every facet of life is touched by Hezbollah activities. There are reportedly 80,000 uniformed personnel in the LAF and some 28,000 in the ISF. It is impossible that the administration will vet all these recipients of U.S. taxpayer dollars and their families. And because there are no controls, there is no way to know how these individuals will use the new cash.

Some amount of it could flow through Hezbollah exchange houses, or possibly be spent at Hezbollah-run businesses and retailers. Some might be used to pay outstanding loans to Hezbollah lenders (like the al-Qard al-Hassan Association). These are just a few possibilities, because there is simply no way the U.S. government will be able to certify that none of its $84 million in fungible cash donations will have found its way to the terror group that dominates Lebanon and permeates its economy.

If Congress allows it to stand, the Biden administration’s new precedent will severely damage the FMF and INCLE programs by turning them into slush funds for financing nation-building projects in Iranian-controlled satrapies and beyond, and possibly even making the United States complicit in financing terrorism.
Nasrallah publicly distances Hezbollah from Iran
If war breaks out between Iran and Israel, Hezbollah may not get involved, according to its Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah. For more stories from The Media Line go to themedialine.org

Nasrallah made the assessment on Tuesday during an interview with the Iran-based Arabic news channel Al-Alam News Network, according to the Lebanese online news portal Naharnet.

It appears to be an attempt by Nasrallah to publicly distance Hezbollah, and himself, from Tehran, analysts say.

Torbjorn Soltvedt, principal analyst of the Middle East and North Africa at Verisk Maplecroft in London, told The Media Line that Nasrallah’s recent comments underscore the delicate political situation in Lebanon at the current moment.

More specifically, Soltvedt said, “Nasrallah will be acutely aware that ongoing allegations that Hezbollah is looking to capitalize on the current political and economic crisis needs to be managed carefully.”

Soltvedt said that, from a domestic political standpoint, it makes sense for Nasrallah to signal Hezbollah’s independence from Tehran in the event of a conflict between Iran and Israel.
MEMRI: Canadian Islamic Scholar: During Desert Storm, We Persuaded 3,000 U.S. Troops to Convert to Islam
At the “Peace Conference Scandinavia,” which was held in Oslo, Norway in March 2010, Canadian Islamic scholar Dr. Bilal Philips, who currently lives in Qatar, delivered a lecture titled “Da’wa in Desert Storm.” Philips, who lived in Saudi Arabia in the early 1990s, recounted his proselytization efforts as part of a group of Muslims who preached Islam to U.S. troops deployed to eastern Saudi Arabia during Operation Desert Storm in 1991. Philips elaborated that he had even taken troops to watch public executions and shari'a law punishments.

“Some heads were chopped off, some hands were chopped off,” he said. According to Philips, 3,000 U.S. troops converted to Islam as a result of these proselytization efforts, which were conducted with the consent of the U.S. authorities. Some of the converted troops moved to Bosnia after being discharged and lent their military expertise to the Bosnians in the Bosnian War. A video of the 2010 speech was posted on Bilal Philips’s official YouTube account on February 6, 2022. According to the description, Peace Conference Scandinavia was held in Oslo on March 27-29, 2010.


Nuclear Deal Would Be Dangerous ‘Mistake,’ Bennett Tells German FM, as Vienna Talks Enter ‘Final Phase’
Prime Minister Naftali Bennett warned Thursday that signing a nuclear agreement with Iran would be a “mistake” as Germany’s foreign minister expressed confidence that such a deal would make the region, including Israel, more secure.

A revived nuclear accord would “endanger the entire region,” Bennett told Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock during a meeting in Tel Aviv. The Israeli leader urged negotiating parties, which include Germany, to set a deadline for the end of negotiations, “since their extension, even as the enrichment of uranium continues, only serves Iranian interests,” he said.

The remarks come as indirect talks between Iran and the United States on trying to salvage the nuclear deal, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, resumed on Tuesday.

At a joint press conference with Israeli counterpart Yair Lapid, Baerbock said that talks with Iran are entering a “final phase.”

“We are at a very critical point. Time is running against the JCPOA since Iran continues with the development of its nuclear program,” Baerbock said. “It’s important that Iran now comes back to the negotiation table with a willingness to compromise and without maximal demands.”

“We want to do everything we can to make sure that with this agreement Israel’s security is guaranteed,” she added.

Lapid reiterated Israel’s position on the Iran nuclear talks in Vienna, echoing Bennett’s remarks that a “nuclear Iran endangers not only Israel, but the entire world.”

“The E-3 countries cannot also ignore the threat posed by Iran beyond its nuclear program,” Lapid argued, referring to Germany, France and the UK. “Iran is Hezbollah in the north, Iran is Hamas in the south, Iran is an exporter of terror from Yemen to Buenos Aires.”
FDD: Ep. 60 — Iran’s global terrorism strategy
Host Bill Roggio is joined by FDD’s Senior Vice President for Research Jonathan Schanzer to have a wide-ranging discussion about the Islamic Republic of Iran’s role as the world’s largest state-sponsor of terror — ranging from its illicit nuclear program to its destabilization of the region via its proxy terrorist groups.

Take a look around the globe today and you’ll see jihadists fighting everywhere from West Africa to Southeast Asia. They aren’t the dominant force in all of those areas, or even most of them. But jihadism has mushroomed into a worldwide movement, with al-Qaeda, the Taliban, ISIS and other groups waging guerrilla warfare and launching terrorist attacks on a regular basis.

Each week Generation Jihad brings you a new story focusing on jihadism around the globe. These stories will focus not only on Sunni jihadism, but also Shiite extremist groups. We will also host guests who can provide their own unique perspectives on current events.







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