By Steve LeVine
Hopeful officials in the Obama administration are circulating (paywall) a description of a potential nuclear deal with Iran, suggesting a chance of success after 11 years of talks in one form or another. To follow what happens next, it’s necessary to understand one basic fact—the calendar favors the Western side, and seriously disadvantages Iran.
In an exclusive interview with Foreign Policy, a top Iranian official says that Khomeini personally stopped him from building Iran’s WMD program.
By Gareth Porter
The nuclear negotiations between six world powers and Iran, which are now nearing their November deadline, remain deadlocked over U.S. demands that Iran dismantle the bulk of its capacity to enrich uranium. The demand is based on the suspicion that Iran has worked secretly to develop nuclear weapons in the past and can’t be trusted not to do so again.
Iran argues that it has rejected nuclear weapons as incompatible with Islam and cites a fatwa of Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei as proof. American and European officials remain skeptical, however, that the issue is really governed by Shiite Islamic principles. They have relied instead on murky intelligence that has never been confirmed about an alleged covert Iranian nuclear weapons program.
But the key to understanding Iran’s policy toward nuclear weapons lies in a historical episode during its eight-year war with Iraq. The story, told in full for the first time here, explains why Iran never retaliated against Iraq’s chemical weapons attacks on Iranian troops and civilians, which killed 20,000 Iranians and severely injured 100,000 more. And it strongly suggests that the Iranian leadership’s aversion to developing chemical and nuclear weapons is deep-rooted and sincere.
A few Iranian sources have previously pointed to a fatwa by the Islamic Republic’s first supreme leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, prohibiting chemical weapons as the explanation for why Iran did not deploy these weapons during the war with Iraq. But no details have ever been made public on when and how Khomeini issued such a fatwa, so it has been ignored for decades.
By Davoud Hermidas Bavand OCTOBER 8, 2014
It might seem counter-intuitive to think that attacking the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, would damage Iran or Shi’ite interests in the Middle East. After all, Iran shares the West’s concerns about the radical Sunni group and is in a tacit alliance with the United States when it comes to defeating their common enemy. And yet, Iran fears it might end up being the loser in this battle.
A group led by foreign policy establishment figure Sadegh Kharazi is trying to revive the fortunes of the reformist movement in a new guise.
Amidst all of the domestic turmoil of Iranian politics and numerous foreign policy issues at the center of the international media spotlight, an attempt by a group of reformists to revive their political current, which has largely fallen outside of the mainstream of Iranian politics since the end of the Green Movement demonstrations, has gone relatively unnoticed. This revival effort has been led by Sadegh Kharazi, among the few reformists in Iran’s senior foreign policy establishment.
By: Roger Cohen 2 Oct. 2014 NYT
LONDON — Breakfast last week in New York with President Hassan Rouhani of Iran was a cordial affair, bereft of the fireworks of his predecessor, whose antics made headlines and not much more. Rouhani, flanked by his twinkly-eyed foreign minister, Mohammad Javad Zarif, was composed, lucid and, on the whole, conciliatory. He said a nuclear accord was doable by the deadline of Nov. 24 “if there is good will and seriousness.” He revealed that he had spoken last year with President Obama about “a number” of possible areas of collaboration in the event of an accord. He did not underplay the difficulties, or the implacability of a deal’s opponents in Iran and the United States, but suggested the “short-lived dustbowl” thrown up by any resolution would dissipate as win-win awareness grew. He even alluded to the aroma of roses. It was a polished performance full of the subtleties intrinsic to the Iranian mind. The question, as always with Iran, is what precisely it meant.
The directors’ campaign is believed to be backed by Iran’s foreign ministry
Six prominent Iranian filmmakers have launched a campaign urging world powers to agree a permanent solution to the dispute over Iran’s nuclear programme.
The directors – including Abbas Kiarostami and Asghar Farhadi, who won Iran’s first Oscar in 2012 – say “there is no deal that is worse than no deal”.
Shafaq News / Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP), led by Kurdistan Region’s President , Massoud Barzani announced that the so-called successor of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria
“ISIS” organization , terrorist Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi arrived to city Mosul, the center of Nineveh province to escape the violent aerial bombardment on Raqqa Syrian city, pointing to the anonymity of his hiding place until now.
A statement posted on the party’s website, followed by “Shafaq News”, said that “after the international coalition began bombing the Syrian cities, in which ISIS elements shelter it in , Baghdadi is now moving between Syria and Iraq, noting that the air strikes targeted him a few weeks ago on his way to Anbar from Syria .
Written by Felice Friedson
Published Monday, September 29, 2014
The sister of a leading Iranian nuclear physicist widely believed to have been assassinated by Israel as part of an effort to derail the Islamic Republic’s drive to create nuclear weapons says her brother was murdered by Iran’s Revolutionary Guard (IRI) because he wouldn’t cooperate with the effort to divert nuclear activities from peaceful purposes.
When Iranian scientist Dr. Ardeshir Hosseinpour was killed in February 2007, the cause of death was reported to be “gassing” and most presumed the act was carried out by Israel. That belief stood, largely because of Iranian accusations to that effect; and because of Israeli policy to neither confirm nor deny such acts. But now, seven years later, Mahboobeh Hosseinpour has come forward with the claim that the IRI was behind her brother’s death because of his refusal to be involved in Iran’s nuclear enrichment program whose use was for atomic purposes.
By Caleb Melby Sep 29, 2014
Manhattan’s Upper West Side.
Billionaire Kamran Hakim was late, and New York Supreme Court Justice Eileen Bransten wanted to know where he was.
“They’re coming up,” Hakim’s attorney, Leo Fox, said to Bransten, according to a court transcript. “In fact, he just asked me what room number it was.”
Hakim arrived to find two of his brothers and their attorneys waiting in the downtown Manhattan court room. Bransten asked him to remove his hat.
Intimate interviews with three women former members of the Mojahedin Khalq who courageously talk about sexual abuse by the leaders, Massoud and Maryam Rajavi. Everyone who has ever heard of the MEK should watch these shocking revelations.
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