https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/04/us-israeli-honeymoon-over-joseph-puder/
It seems that the Trump era ‘honeymoon’ in US – Israeli relations is over under the new administration of Joe Biden. The US is now prepared to go back to previous policies of so-called ‘evenhandedness’ between Israel and the Palestinians. Furthermore, the Biden administration appears to return to the Obama administration policy of appeasing the Islamic Republic of Iran.
Last week, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken briefed Israel’s Foreign Minister Gabi Ashkenazi about the Biden administration’s plan for the indirect talks with the Iranians in Vienna. He said that he did not believe the meeting would bear fruit. The New York Times reported (April 6, 2021) that, “The United States and Iran agreed through intermediaries on Tuesday to establish two working groups to try to get both countries back into compliance with the 2015 Iran nuclear deal.” At the moment there is a battle of wills. The Iranian officials claim that they can return to compliance fairly quickly, but demand that the US must first lift the sanctions. The US wants the Iranians to move first to return to compliance before sanctions are eased. The Iranians, it should be said, refused to deal directly with the Americans.
The Iranian economy is in shambles as the result of the Trump administration sanctions, and it would seem that the Iranians are in a weak position in the upcoming bargaining. In the meantime, however, US officials estimated that Iran’s ‘breakout time’ to a nuclear bomb is down to a few months. That might be the ostensible reason why the Biden administration is so eager to engage with Iran’s radical regime. The Iranian’s, on their part, know how eager Biden is to reverse Trump’s actions vis-à-vis Iran. The operative question is simply this: are US officials wrong about the ‘breakout time,’ and are the Iranians, in order to strengthen their bargaining position, are exaggerating their progress. Conversely, the Iranians may already have the bomb, and have most certainly the ‘know how’ to assemble a bomb. In whatever the case may be, it is unlikely that Iran would be flexible enough to agree to the US requests for modifications to the 2015 nuclear deal, such as extending the expiration time. The Ayatollahs have already announced that they are opposed to any change. That means that the US and the western powers would have to relent on Iran’s development of long-range missiles that could carry nuclear payloads. Tehran would certainly oppose the US demand that it ends its nefarious terrorist behavior in the Middle East region and beyond.