A Purim Contemplation: Iran's Past Concealing Behaviors Over Their Nuclear Program

 Nadene Goldfoot                                          

          Tehran, Iran 8.694 million;  capital of Iran, in the north of the country. Its central Golestan Palace complex, with its ornate rooms and marble throne, was the seat of power of the Qajar dynasty. The National Jewelry Museum holds many of the Qajar monarchs’ jewels, while the National Museum of Iran has artifacts dating back to Paleolithic times. The Milad Tower offers panoramic views over the city.  Iran has 76,923,300 population in 2011 and is 98%Shi'a Muslims.  It's the 6th largest Muslim majority country.  And just beyond the city are nuclear power plants.  

                                                                    

                          John Kerry, one of the "deal makers of the 5+1."  

The USA has been talking with Iran about its nuclear program and was to be concluded at the final end of the June 2015 deadline.  President Obama had been president since 2009 and would continue till 2017.  The president of Iran at that time was Hassan Rouhani.

                                                     

               The Two Presidents:  Hassan Rouhani and Barack Obama
   You would think it was in both their personal and national interests to "clinch a deal." Look what had been going on till this point.

     Iran's president is not a president like the American president who has to answer to the House and Senate on many decisions.  Iran's president is ruled by the  Ayatollah of that period. 

       Sayyid Ruhollah Musavi Khomeini, also known in the Western world as Ayatollah Khomeini, was an Iranian politician, revolutionary, and cleric.  He died in 1989.  In September 1980, Iraq launched a full-scale invasion of Iran, beginning the Iran–Iraq War (September 1980 – August 1988). That's when Danny and I made aliyah to Israel.   He was the founder of the Islamic Republic of Iran and the leader of the 1979 Iranian Revolution, which saw the overthrow of the last Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and the end of the 2,500-year-old Persian monarchy. Following the revolution, Khomeini became the country's Supreme Leader, a position created in the constitution of the Islamic Republic as the highest-ranking political and religious authority of the nation, which he held until his death. Most of his reign was taken up by the Iran–Iraq War of 1980–1988. He was succeeded by Ali Khamenei on 4 June 1989.
                                           

August 2002:  Iran's opposition group, National Council of Resistance of Iran-a front for the militant People's Army, tells of construction of a nuclear reactor to produce plutonium at Arak and a uranium enrichment facility with centrifuges at Natanz.  Supposedly this information came from Israeli intelligence and was forwarded to the Resistance group.  It increased international fears that Iran was conspiring to build nuclear weapons under "a civilian project."

                                                    

Sayyid Mohammad Khatami served as the fifth President of Iran from 3 August 1997 to 3 August 2005. He also served as Iran's Minister of Culture from 1982 to 1992. Later, he was critical of the government of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

February 2003:  Iranian President Muhammad Khatami says they do have the Natanz facility and that inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) can visit the site and other facilities !

June 2003:  IAEA report finds that Iran has violated its international nuclear obligations and agreements.

October 2003:  UK, Germany and France (the EU-3) launch diplomatic efforts to address Iran's nuclear policy.  The US refuses to be involved in the talks.

October 2003:  Iran agrees with EU-3 (Tehran Declaration"). Iran agrees to suspend all uranium enrichment.  The USS backed the agreement from the outset.                                          

                              Ahmadinejad's constant threats to Israel  

August 2005:  Mahmoud Ahmadinejad became president of Iran, abandoned the agreement and restarted Iran's uranium enrichment activity and construction of the Natanz reactor.                     

                                Iran and China's heads together

June 2006:  IAEA says Iran is a "non-compliant" state.  China, US and Russia join the UK, Germany and France to form the P5+1 group to deal with the fear that Iran is on its way to make its first nuclear bomb!  

December 2006-2010:   UN Security Council passes 6 resolutions that Iran stop uranium enrichment, activities related and imposes sanctions against Iranian individuals and companies linked to the nuclear and missile programs.  

                                                     

Yukiya Amano was a Japanese diplomat and the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency. Amano previously served as an international civil servant for the United Nations and its subdivisions. On 22 July 2019, IAEA announced that Amano had died.

          2007:  CIA publishes their "National Intelligence Estimate" saying that in 2003 the IAEA Director General, Yukiya Amano, addressed a news conference at IAEA headquarters in Vienna on June 8th.  Any possible military dimensions of Iran's nuclear program can be clarified if the details of a preliminary deal sealed in April between Tehran and the 6 world powers are implemented.  Iran had stopped working on the nuclear military program.  This estimate was not accepted by Israeli intelligence, which claimed that Iran never stopped its clandestine and covert nuclear military research.  

       2007-2011:  Israel's intelligence led by Mossad initiates systematic  covert operations aimed at creating physical and psychological havoc, according to foreign reports.  The measures taken were an assassination campaign against Iranian scientists and sabotage of equipment and facilities.  This was supplemented by a joint venture with the CIA.  These 2 espionage agencies wrote a code for a malicious virus called Stuxnet, which was planted in computers operating the centrifuges in Natanz.  1/3 of the centrifuges were damaged.

                                                    

                            Fordow nuclear plant in Iran  

September 2009:  Obama reveals existence of Fordow, near Qom in Iran.  It's a small, heavily fortified underground enrichment facility.  Information came from US, Britain, Israel and others.  Fordow was built for a military program.  US and Israel talked about air strikes, military action.  

        2009-2011:  PM Netanyahu and Defense Minister Ehud Barak lead campaign of threats to attack unless the international community tightened sanctions against Iran.  Neither wanted this and so this was a bluff.  General Ashkenazi and Mossad's head man, Meir Dagan were against war.  All in Israel believed the bluff.

      2010-2013:  More sanctions were given to Iran.  Iran's oil, petrochemical production, exports, shipping, insurance were targeted, and Iranian banks were cut off, blacklisted.   Over $100 billion in Iranian deposits were frozen around the world.                    

September 26, 2012:  What will happen in 2022?                       

  Netanyahu at UN speaking,  reaching  the red line about Iran's ability with nuclear power.  

2012:  WASHINGTON/JERUSALEM (Reuters) - In a highly unusual rebuff to a close ally, the White House said on Tuesday that President Barack Obama would not meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during a U.S. visit later this month, as tensions escalated over how to deal with Iran’s nuclear program.                                  

Spring 2013:  Iran's economy suffered, lost $160 billion in revenues.  They suffered from inflation, unemployment, currency devaluing.  Their SUPREME LEADER, ALI KHAMENEI, decided to change course.  He green lighted the replacement of Ahmadinejad who served 2 terrible terms. Now Iran has reached one of its goals.  They've been able to master most aspects of the nuclear process and has become a nuclear threshold state.  

November 2013:  Iran and P5+1 agree. it's called the Joint Plan of Action.  It limits Iran's nuclear program.  Arak reactor stops, stockpile of 20% enriched uranium is decreased and they will enrich uranium up to 5%.  Some minor sanctions are lifted.  2 deadlines for a comprehensive agreement are not met.                                               

            Iran's Parchin military facility.  Parchin is an Iranian military complex, located about 30 kilometres southeast of Tehran. It is closely linked with the Khojir missile production complex.To the northwest of Parchin in the Barjamali Hills, a test range for liquid-propellant missile engines is part of the Shahid Hemmat Industrial Group (SHIG) Khojir research facility 35°39′50″N 51°43′45″E where signature of engine test stand firing, probably including technology from the Russian SS-4 Sandal missile, was confirmed by an American spy satellite in August 1997.^[2]

On December 15, 1997, SHIG conducted at least a sixth 1997 test of an engine needed for an 800-mile-range (1,300 km) ballistic missile. The test was either the sixth or the eighth during 1997 according to available intelligence

                                                           

                               Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant:   is a nuclear power plant in Iran 17 kilometres southeast of the city of Bushehr, between the fishing villages of Halileh and Bandargeh along the Persian Gulf.  Construction of the plant was started in 1975 by German companies, but the work was stopped in 1979 after the Islamic revolution of Iran.  That's when the Shah was kicked out and Ayatollah's replaced him.  

                           Iranian army in parade

April 2015:  Iran and P5+1 have deal for 10 years.  Iran cannot enrich uranium over 5%, need to dismantle 75% of 19,000 centrifuges in Natanz, remove fissile materials from Fordow and dismantle elements of Arak reactor so as not to produce plutonium.  Removed equipment is to be put under strict IAEA inspection who will install seals and cameras linked to headquarters in Vienna.  Iran cannot produce advanced centrifuges, agree to intrusive inspection regime by IAEA including military sites.  In return, sanctions will be lifted gradually.  

                                                       

        Mohammad Javad Zarif is an Iranian career diplomat and academic. He has been foreign minister of Iran since 2013.

At the end of July 2015, Iran had begun to use doublespeak.  While talking, Mohammad Zarif agreed to most of the clauses in the draft agreement but when he returned to Iran, made different statements.  They declared that the sanctions will be lifted from Day 1 -not after phase 1.  Ali Khamenei and Rouhani made statements that military sites are off limits and said this to the Iranian parliament.  They contradicted what was agreed upon.  Yossi Melman thought that with linguistic creativity, differences could be bridged and resolved.  6 years have passed by and nothing has changed except the American president.    

"On January 16, 2016, the International Atomic Energy Agency verified that Iran has completed the necessary steps under the Iran deal that will ensure Iran's nuclear program is and remains exclusively peaceful."  They did not consider that what was said in the meeting and what was said to Iranians were 2 different things.                                             

U.S. President Donald Trump holds up a memorandum reinstating sanctions on Iran after the U.S. withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal at the White House in Washington on May 8, 2018. CHIP SOMODEVILLA/GETTY IMAGES.  

   2021:  Robert Malley is the focal point for opening salvos over President Biden’s approach to the Middle East, and the value of a new deal with Iran.    

Malley, a Democrat born in 1963, New York   is an American lawyer, political scientist and specialist in conflict resolution, who was the lead negotiator on the 2015 Iran nuclear deal known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.  It was his father, Simon Malley, who was born in Egypt and was a leftist Jewish journalist.  His mother was Barbara Silverstein.  

Saturday, January 11, the first day of the week in Iran’s calendar, has been a very long day for Iranians.  The day started with the Iranian armed forces publicly accepting responsibility for shooting down the Ukrainian airliner, Flight 752, as covered by IranWire earlier today.  

                                                       

      Iran has told population corona 19 virus is plot caused by USA and Israel.

Iran has decided to escalate tensions with the West by publicly confirming the production of enriched uranium at an underground nuclear facility and seizing a South Korean oil tanker transiting the Persian Gulf. This escalation may be designed to put additional pressure on President-elect Joe Biden to rejoin the 2015 Iran nuclear deal—a move that would give extensive sanctions relief to a regime under enormous economic stress. But if Biden were to give in to nuclear extortion and abandon sanctions, he would surrender his most important leverage against Tehran and never achieve his stated goal of negotiating a longer-lasting, better agreement.

Last month's escalation of tensions by Tehran looks like blackmail to force Biden to abandon sanctions—and give up leverage over the regime.  He plans to rejoin the  old Iran deal.  

Iran is in the power of a religious leader, an Ayatollah, not a president and cabinet.  He is their Supreme Leader.  Chances are that he will have power over their nuclear facilities and will be able to say when to use them.  He views Jews of the IDF and Jews in a synagogue differently.  He's at war with Israel.  Why?  Who knows?  Maybe it's because Jews had the chutzpa to return to their native homeland after 2,000 years.  Haman tried to wipe all Jews out.  He didn't succeed.  Hitler didn't succeed.  We're here to stay.  

Resource:

The Jerusalem Report, July 13, 2015; pages 20-23.  Nuclear timeline  by Yossi Melman, an intelligence Report.  

https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/issues/foreign-policy/iran-deal

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/13/us/politics/robert-malley-iran-middle-east.html

https://foreignpolicy.com/2021/01/08/biden-iran-nuclear-deal-sanctions-uranium-enrichment/