Obama - Has A Thing About Christians! Jewish Settlements No, Muslim Nuclear Bomb OK! Doing A Deal On The Graves of 5000,000 Iranian Children!

Water Water Everywhere But Ne'er A Drop To Drink!

"The reason politicians try so hard to get re-elected is that they would "hate" to have to make a living under the laws they have just passed."

"A man goes to see the Rabbi.  "Rabbi, something terrible is happening and I have to talk to you about it."

The Rabbi asked, "What's wrong?"

The man replied, "My wife is going to poison me."

The Rabbi, very surprised by this, asks, "How can that be?"

The man then pleads, "I'm telling you, I'm certain she's going to poison me. What should I do?"

The Rabbi then offers, "Tell you what. Let me talk to her, I'll see what I can find out and I'll let you know."

A week later the Rabbi calls the man and says, "I spoke to your wife on the phone for three hours.  You want my advice?"

The man said, "Yes" and the Rabbi replied, "Take the poison."

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I have been a CUFI (Christians United For Israel) member for years.  This is their message to Obama and Kerry.  (See 1 below.)

Have we reached the point where there needs to be an organization called JFC (Jews For Christians)?

Newt calls Obama's hand again! (See 1a below.)

and that of others (See 1b and 1c below.)

This from a friend and fellow memo reader: "So Israel would like Iranians to recognize Israel in exchange for allowing them to build a nuclear war machine. And Barry's answer? "Well, hating Jews is part of their culture, and we don't want to get in the middle of that. By the way, don't forget ... Don't build any more of those damn apartments, uh, I mean 'settlements'."
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Can Schumer be trusted?  I have serious doubts. He is just too slick for my blood. (See 2 below.)
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Mass counts! More so when you are tiny!(See 3 below.)

The Ayatollah used mass to clear mine fields - half a million Iranian children.  Obama overlooked this of course because none of these children resembled the son he might have had. (See 3a below.)
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Obama's deal is beginning to fall apart because he gave everything up front and thereby, broadcast weakness and now Iran's leader is digging his heels in knowing how bad Obama lusts for it to happen. (See 4 and 4a below.)
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Dick
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1)--Dear Richard,

With each passing day, we learn more about the so-called framework agreement reached with Iran in Switzerland last week.  None of the news is good. We need to speak out against this deal now.

The framework starts from the deeply flawed premise that Iran will honor this agreement despite its extensive record of cheating.  But even if Iran shocks the world and keeps it word, it merely postpones the day of reckoning.  By President Obama's own admission, this deal permits Iran to obtain a nuclear weapons capability towards the end of the deal’s term.

In the meantime, the economic sanctions regime will end and billions of dollars will flow into a newly legitimate Iran. Iran will be perfectly free to use these new riches to:

• Research and develop advanced centrifuges (the Iranians claim they will also be free touse these advanced centrifuges);
• Research and develop ballistic missiles that can deliver atomic weapons to the United States;
• Kill more Israelis by sending more funds and missiles to Hezbollah and Hamas;
• Massacre more Arabs by sending more funds and weapons to Syria’s Assad, the Shiite militias in Iraq, and the Houthi rebels in Yemen.

We know that President Obama and Secretary Kerry are not in the habit of listening to the American people.  But this doesn’t relieve us of our obligation to speak!

Pastor John Hagee              David Brog
Chairman                           Executive Director

1a) To Obama: The Victims are Christians and Jews

 Dick:

President Obama has a strange pattern of citing Christians for violence and intolerance on the one hand but refusing to identify them as the targets of Islamist supremacists on the other.

In fact, in his remarks at the National Prayer Breakfast the President stretched back more than 800 years to declare that "during the Crusades and the Inquisition, people committed terrible deeds in the name of Christ."

This was a remarkably one-sided history of a long series of wars between Christians and Muslims in which atrocities were common on both sides. The President may not know that Saladin had more than 200 knights beheaded on July 4, 1187, or that in 1680 Turks cut off the heads of 813 Christians in Otranto, Italy (a group Pope Francis declared saints for their willingness to die for Christ). There were atrocities on both sides of these wars. Yet President Obama only found the violence perpetrated by Christians worth mentioning.

Referring to more recent history, this is how President Obama chose to describe an Islamic supremacist murdering Jews in France earlier this year “violent, vicious zealots who...randomly shoot a bunch of folks in a deli in Paris."

The dishonesty of this statement is breathtaking. There was nothing random about the attack. It was deliberate. The attacker didn't "randomly shoot a bunch of folks in a deli in Paris". The attacker himself said in the media that he went out to kill Jews. The "folks" in the President's language were Jews. The “zealots” were Muslim supremacists.

Why does President Obama find it impossible to say "a Muslim supremacist deliberately killed a group of Jews in a religiously inspired attack"?

President Obama was similarly abstract when commenting on the beheading of Egyptian Christians by ISIS in a televised act of religious hatred. He issued a statement saying it was a "despicable and cowardly murder of 21 Egyptian citizens in Libya." He described it as "the wanton killing of innocents."

Once again President Obama hides from what truly motivated the killing. ISIS wasn't randomly killing Egyptians. ISIS was killing Christians. The victims weren't, as the President asserted, just "innocents". The victims were guilty of being Christian.

Finally, consider the recent killing of Christians in Kenya. When radical Islamist terrorists killed more than 140 people at Garissa University College, the Associated Press reported, “The attackers separated Christian students from Muslim ones and massacred the Christians.”

How did the Obama Administration describe this religiously motivated massacre? The President's statement referred only to "innocent men and women...brazenly and brutally massacred."

Once again he failed to identify the religion of the dead or the religion of their killers--in both cases the factor that explained the events.

Sarah Kaplan of the Washington Post captured this refusal to describe Christian and Jewish victims in a remarkable recent article, "Has the world ‘looked the other way’ while Christians are killed?"

She reports:

David Curry, president of the nonprofit Open Doors USA, which advocates for persecuted Christians worldwide, believes so.

“We see a continued pattern in many of these regions of violence and persecution against Christians,” he said in a phone interview. “But the West and Western governments, including the U.S., when they conflict-map these issues, they refuse to address the fact that Christians are being targeted.”

According to Open Doors, 2014 saw a huge increase in violence against Christians. Researchers for the group found that 4,344 Christians were killed for faith-related reasons between Dec. 1, 2013 and Nov. 30, 2014 — more than twice the number killed during the same period the previous year. Curry says those numbers are a low estimate, as the group only counts incidents in which the victim can be identified by name and an exact cause has been attributed.

In its annual “World Watch” report, which ranks the 50 countries where persecution of Christians is most severe, the group said the past year “will go down in history for having the highest level of global persecution of Christians in the modern era” and suggested that “the worst is yet to come.”

Kaplan went on to quote Pope Francis over Easter weekend:

“Our brothers and our sisters … are persecuted, exiled, slain, beheaded, solely for being Christian,” he said, his expression tense, his cadence slow but deliberate. Speaking from a window of the Apostolic Palace, the Pope said that there have been more “martyrs” for Christianity in recent years than in the early centuries of the faith.

“I hope that the international community doesn’t stand mute and inert before such unacceptable crimes, which constitute a worrisome erosion of the most elementary human rights. I truly hope that the international community doesn’t look the other way.”

The persecution of Christians is a theme that ran through most of the pope’s speeches this weekend. At a Good Friday procession, he decried the world’s “complicit silence” while members of his faith are killed. On Sunday, he devoted his Easter address to a grim accounting of global conflicts where Christians and others have been killed.

I was moved to write this lengthy newsletter by Cardinal Wuerl's Easter Sunday homily at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception (where Callista sings in the choir).

The Cardinal enjoined: "Today we must raise our voices on behalf of suffering Christians around the world, victims of terrorist/extremist attacks simply because they dare to say Christ is risen....”

He went on: "Pope Francis, in his Easter message...asked all of us not to remain silent...in the face of this terrible plague --violence on our Christian brothers and sisters and all others suffering religious persecution.”

His plea inspired me to ask you to join in speaking out and telling the truth.

If enough of us insist on identifying the religious victims of this war against Christians and Jews, perhaps the President will have the courage to join us in telling the whole truth.

Once we confront the truth, we can begin designing strategies to defeat the Islamist supremacists who would force us to submit or die.

Your Friend,
Newt

1b)-  The United States must be prepared to walk away

By Michael B. Oren, Israel’s former Ambassador to the United States, is a Member of Israel’s Knesset from the Kulanu Party.

 

 

 Want to purchase a carpet in the Middle East? If so, the first question the merchant will ask you is, “How much do you want to spend?” Seasoned buyers never answer. They know that whatever amount they cite will become the baseline for the negotiation. They understand that the merchant’s smiles, the many cups of tea he serves, his invitations to stroll along the riverbank, are all part of his selling tactic. So, too, are his protests — in response to any offer — of wounded pride. Veterans of Middle East carpet markets expect the give-and-take to be lengthy, even exhausting, but are always willing to leave the shop.

 

The parameters agreement for a Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran is an ideal example of how not to buy a Middle Eastern carpet. In 2012, President Barack Obama declared that, “The deal we’ll accept is that they end their nuclear program” and “abide by the UN resolutions” demanding that Iran cease all uranium enrichment and dismantle its nuclear plants. The Security Council’s five permanent members plus Germany could have offered the lowest possible price as their final bid — take it or leave it. Iran would have had little choice but to sell the carpet.

 

Yet, in reaching the parameters agreement, international negotiators were worn down by the protracted talks. They were persuaded by Iran’s displays of warmth and earnestness, and accepted its claim that the nuclear program was a matter of national pride similar to America’s moon landing. Most damagingly, when asked by the Iranians “how much do you want to spend?” the P5+1 replied by recognizing the Islamic Republic’s right to enrich and to maintain its nuclear facilities. This became the new baseline and the only remaining questions were: How much enrichment and how many facilities? The haggling had scarcely begun and already the merchant profited.

 

At this point, the only advantage the customer retains is the ability to stop bargaining. This is what Ronald Reagan did at the 1986 Reykjavik summit and later obtained significant Soviet concessions. But, despite repeated White House warnings that “Iran’s window to obtain a peaceful resolution will not remain open forever,” the window never closed. Nor did the Iranians ever believe it would or that they have to pay a price for keeping it open.

 

Instead of telling the Iranians that “if you don’t take this offer, our next one will be smaller,” the P5+1 said, “If you don’t like these terms, perhaps we can improve them.” Rather than responding to Iranian intransigence with heightened sanctions and credible military force, negotiators removed these options. Experienced carpet buyers know when to walk away and let the merchant come chasing after them. But, in reaching the parameters agreement, it was the Iranians, rather than the P5+1, who always threatened to bolt. The customers begged the merchant to stay.

 

The Middle Eastern form of negotiating, perfected over thousands of years, should no longer be alien to Westerners. The Palestinians have employed it repeatedly, starting each round of peace talks with “how much are you willing to spend?” If the answer is a Palestinian state based on the 1967 lines with mutually agreed swaps and its capital in East Jerusalem, be assured that this will be their new opening position. The Palestinians — not the Israelis — keep walking away from the table, each time pocketing their newly-obtained concessions. Nobody should be surprised, when discussions on a final nuclear agreement begin, Iranian delegates treat the parameters agreement as the baseline for garnering an even better price.

 

To prevent that, the United States and its P5+1 partners must reject any further Iranian demands. They should make clear to Tehran that it risks losing the gains it has made while facing punitive measures such as ramped-up sanctions. They must be prepared to walk way. At the same time, effective mechanisms must be put into place for rapidly responding to Iranian violations. The world must provide for the possibility that the treaty — like the carpet — will fall apart.

 

The Iranians are not just expert carpet merchants. They also deal in terror and endangering American allies. Proceeds from this deal will no doubt fund those activities. And the Iranians, we know, cheat. For more than 30 years, they have lied about every aspect of their nuclear program, built secret, fortified facilities, violated the Non-Proliferation Treaty, and hidden their previous work on atomic weapons. Still, much of the world wants their carpet. Only later, when its colors quickly fade and its threads unravel, will they discover that, in the Middle East, there is no return policy.

1b) Jerusalem Post:

Photo by: REUTERS Iran will sign nuclear deal only if all sanctions lifted, Rouhani says Earlier this week US said it would accept sanctions being “phased out” and it would not budge from its position.

ANKARA, April 9 (Reuters) - Iran will only agree to a final nuclear accord with six major powers if all sanctions imposed  on the country over its disputed nuclear work are lifted, President Hassan Rouhani said in a televised speech on  Thursday. "We will not sign any deal unless all sanctions are lifted on the same day ... We want a win-win deal for all parties involved  in the nuclear talks," Rouhani said. The world powers and Iran have not yet agreed on the pace of sanctions relief, a fundamental component of the structure  of a nuclear deal. Earlier this week, the White House said that international sanctions would be lifted only gradually. The disagreement between the parties is over how to pair international sanctions relief for Iran with its demonstrated  compliance with an accord. Washington stipulated that it would accept sanctions being “phased out” only as Tehran complies with a final agreement to  halt its nuclear program.  White House press secretary Josh Earnest said on Monday that the US would not budge from its position. A phased  approach is the only way to incentivize Iran to comply over the life of the deal, he said, which includes provisions lasting  between 10 and 25 years. “You can’t start talking about relieving sanctions until we’ve reached agreements about how we’re going to shut down  every pathway they have to a nuclear weapon,” Earnest told reporters. Under the framework deal with Iran reached earlier this month, framing the parameters of a larger, more technical  agreement due by June 30, Iran will be allowed to continue the enrichment of uranium and will close no facilities.  ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2)-- What Is Schumer Really Up to on Iran Vote? By Jonathan S. Tobin  Yesterday Senator Chuck Schumer fired a shot over the bow of the White House when he reaffirmed his support for giving Congress a say in the Iran nuclear deal. At a time when President Obama is going all-out to convince the country—and especially wavering Senate Democrats—that he should be trusted to strike a nuclear bargain with the Islamist regime without congressional interference, Schumer’s defection is a blow to the administration. Or is it? Keen political observers need to judge Schumer’s conduct not so much on his own vote but by whether he helps persuade other Democrats to join him. If in the end, the Corker-Menendez bill that would mandate a Senate vote on any agreement with Iran falls short of a veto-proof majority, there will be reasonable suspicions as to whether Democrats played a vote-trading game that will allow senators with strong pro-Israel constituencies to vote against the White House while others provide Obama with the margin he needs. As I wrote last week, Schumer is in a very difficult position on the Iran debate because of his status as the Senate Democratic leader-in-waiting. Having secured the support of his caucus 21 months in advance of current Minority Leader Harry Reid’s retirement, Schumer is preparing to assume a role that brings with it the responsibility of backing the president in confrontations with Republicans. While on most issues that will be no problem for a reliable liberal such as Schumer, with respect to Israel it is increasingly impossible for any Democrat to remain loyal to the president and to their principles about backing the Jewish state. Contrary to the White House talking points in which tension between Israel and the United States is blamed on Prime Minister Netanyahu’s supposed tilt toward the Republicans, the fault for this situation is almost completely the work of President Obama. It is he who has sought to split the formerly bipartisan consensus on Israel and Iran sanctions by seeking to persuade Democrats to stick with him on a course of appeasement because of party loyalty. Though some, like currently embattled Senator Bob Menendez, have stood up to Obama, many others have backed away from their previous stands. Others, like Schumer, have tried to plot a middle course in which he seeks to keep good relations with the White House while taking an independent position. But while it is one thing for members of the Senate who are not part of the leadership to challenge Obama, it is far more difficult for someone like Schumer. Seen in that light, his announcement about support for Corker-Menendez is quite significant. Indeed, it is possible that Schumer’s statement could give cover to other Democrats to follow suit. Given that a dozen are already on record as backing the bill, if all of them vote for it along with a unanimous Republican caucus, that would leave the measure just one vote short of a veto-proof majority. Getting one more vote for something that he cares deeply about ought to be no trouble for a legislator of Schumer’s acumen. But getting to 67 votes for the bill as currently constituted may be a heavier lift than it looks. There are two distinct possibilities that may derail the effort. One is if some of the dozen Democrats currently co-sponsoring Corker-Menendez are persuaded by the White House to agree to watering it down. The White House has said it is prepared to live with a version of the bill that would allow a purely symbolic vote on an Iran deal. That could satisfy some Democrats who want to be able to tell their constituents and pro-Israel donors that they had voted for accountability on the deal while at the same time they were actually doing the bidding of the president. Schumer has rightly said that Congress deserves an up-or-down vote on the deal itself rather than a meaningless symbolic ballot on it. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chair Bob Corker has said that he also can’t accept that, even if he is someone who appears to want to do business with the administration and may not be counted on to hold the line on opposing a dangerously weak Iran deal. But it is possible that some of the Democratic co-sponsors like Kirsten Gillibrand or Joe Manchin may insist on symbolism rather than the Senate exercising its constitutional obligation to vote on what may be among the most significant foreign treaties agreed to by the United States in the last generation. But assuming that Corker and Schumer stand up for a real vote, another possibility may prevent a veto-proof majority that seems easily within reach. With the White House ruthlessly lobbying Democrats to vote against the bill in order to defend the president’s prerogatives, it won’t be easy getting to 67. At that point, Schumer and other leading Democrats may engage in one of the age-old traditions of Congress in which votes are traded. If Schumer is not truly serious about passing Corker-Menendez, what will follow will be a series of bargains struck between various senators and the White House that would allow just enough Democrats to vote for the bill without allowing it to get to 67. In that case, senators like Schumer and Gillibrand might be freed up to vote against the president just as long as they are sure that enough Democrats will vote with him in order to ensure the margin of victory falls short of the two-thirds mark that would make it veto-proof. If that happens, then the blame will fall not just on the Democrats who allow the president to veto the bill with impunity but on those who helped negotiate the deals that enabled this to happen. And Chuck Schumer, the master-manipulator seeking to serve both the White House and the pro-Israel community, will stand accused as the chief architect of the outcome. Schumer may vote for Corker-Menendez but if it fails to get to 67, you may be sure that he had a hand in that coming to pass. If so, his protestations of sorrow about the failure may convince some of his supporters, but those with a better grasp of how the Senate works will know better. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3) AGREEMENT WITH IRAN: REQUIEM FOR A NUCLEAR ISRAEL? Author:  Louis René Beres ↓   Somehow, although it has yet to be mentioned, there is a plainly foreseeable connection between the just-completed nuclear agreement with Iran, and Israel’s nuclear weapons program. Inevitably, the mere pretense of Iranian compliance with newly codified nuclear curtailment norms will place corollary pressures upon Israel to join the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), or a regional nuclear weapons free zone. This is the case, moreover, even if Israel’s bomb would remain benignly in the “basement,” that is, undeclared and unthreatening. In world politics, some truths are unassailable. Without its nuclear weapons and doctrine, Israel could effectively become complicit in its own disappearance. More precisely, should Israel ever be compelled to accept its own denuclearization, that country – less than half the size of America's Lake Michigan – might as well consent publicly to incremental dismemberment. Indeed, even if pertinent enemy states, Arab countries as well as Iran, were to remain non-nuclear themselves, these irremediable foes and their terrorist surrogates would still be in an enhanced position to defeat Israel. In global strategy, as Clausewitz, the famous Prussian strategist, had understood long before the Atomic Age, there can come a time of reckoning when “mass counts.” In the Middle East, lest we forget, only Israel’s enemies have mass. Over the years, a number of Arab states and Iran, themselves still non-nuclear, have called disingenuously for Israel's membership in the NPT, and for a “nuclear weapon free zone.” Looking ahead, even if these viscerally sectarian and fragmenting states were willing to comply with any formal legal expectations of such a zone – a remarkably optimistic  presumption – their more-or-less combined conventional, chemical and biological capabilities could still overwhelm Israel. Might diplomacy help to correct any such imbalance? In principle, it would seem, expanded Israeli vulnerability might still be countered by instituting certain parallel forms of non-nuclear disarmament among the Arab states and Iran. In reality, however, any such coinciding and reciprocal steps would never be undertaken. President Obama, who calls passionately for a world “free of nuclear weapons,” fails to realize that rhythmically stirring oratory is not always enough. In fact, for the region as a whole, nuclear weapons are not the problem per se. Rather, in the Middle East, the core issue remains a far-reaching and unreconstructed Arab/Iranian commitment to excise Israel from the map. The only primal issue here concerns a blatantly extinctive Islamic cartography. Oddly, perhaps, Palestinian and Iranian maps reveal wholly unhidden plans for genocide against “the Jews.” In both cases, religiously, at least, these openly contemplated crimes against humanity stem conspicuously from assorted sacred eschatologies of “sacrifice” and “martyrdom.” Here, too, the exterminatory doctrines derive equally from Sunni and Shiite sources. With its nuclear weapons, even while still “deliberately ambiguous,” or in the “basement,” Israel can deter enemy unconventional attacks, and also most large conventional ones. While in possession of such weapons, Israel could also launch certain cost-effective non nuclear preemptive strikes against any enemy state’s hard military targets that might threaten Israel’s annihilation. Without these nuclear weapons, any such expressions of “anticipatory self-defense” could likely represent the onset of a much wider and asymmetrically destructive (to Israel) war. The rationale for this argument is readily identifiable. In essence, without nuclear backup, there would no longer exist any compelling threat of an Israeli counter-retaliation. It follows, contrary to the U.S. president’s misplaced preferences for global nuclear disarmament, that Israel’s nuclear weapons represent a vitally important instrument of regional peace, and, correspondingly, a needed impediment to regional nuclear war. Always, strategy requires nuance. In his blanket proposal for “a world without nuclear weapons,” however, Obama has been thinking without any differentiation or subtlety. To survive into the future, the international community will have to make various critical nuclear distinctions between individual states and national nuclear deterrence postures. In the special case of Israel, it will soon need to be acknowledged, nuclear weapons are potentially all that can prevent a grievously destructive and genocidal war. Significantly, the residual national right to threaten or even use nuclear weapons in order to survive is enshrined jurisprudentially at the 1996 Advisory Opinion on Nuclear Weapons, by the U.N.'s International Court of Justice. Neither the president of the United States nor the U.N. Security Council can assure Israel’s survival amid growing regional chaos. In the specific matter of nuclear weapons, moreover, not all countries are created equal. For Israel, legitimately, these weapons represent the ultimate barrier to suffering violent extinction. They are, for Israel, and also for the wider system of civilized states, a latent blessing, not a curse. Under international law, war and genocide are not mutually exclusive. Living in a world without Israeli nuclear weapons, Israel’s principal enemies could quickly drive the Jewish state into an eternal darkness, into fire, into ice. Such expressly genocidal action could seem altogether reasonable and rational for the perpetrators. This is because, individually or collaboratively, these aggressor states could now inflict distinctly mortal harms upon a theologically despised foe, and without incurring intolerable harms themselves. For the moment, following the unwitting legitimization of Iranian nuclearization via patently futile diplomacy, Israel has the most to fear from Tehran. To be sure, if Iran's religious leadership should ever choose to abandon the usual premises of rational behavior in world politics –  that is, to risk national destruction in a presumptive exchange for purifying the Dar al-Islam, the World of Islam – even Jerusalem's nuclear posture could fail. Nonetheless, even if Iran could sometime become a nuclear suicide-bomber writ large, Israel's only rational strategy, moving forward, must be (1) to hold on firmly to its nuclear armaments, and, as soon as Iran crosses the operational nuclear threshold, (2) to move determinedly beyond “deliberate ambiguity,” toward carefully selected forms of nuclear disclosure. International law is not a suicide pact. Long before atomic weapons, Cicero had already understood: “The safety of the people shall be the highest law.” For Israel, living uneasily in plausible expectation of renewed global pressures to renounce its nuclear weapons and posture, resisting such illegitimate pressures will remain indispensable. Beres was educated at Princeton (Ph.D., 1971).  He is the author of many books and articles dealing with Israeli defense matters, and was chair of Project Daniel during the premiership of Ariel Sharon. He is professor of International Law at Purdue University. ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3)The Iran challenge: Is there another way?  Ambassador (ret.) Yoram Ettinger, "Second Thought: a US-Israel Initiative" "Israel Hayom", April 9, 2015, http://bit.ly/1OdaGmV President Obama asserted on April 2, 2015 that he was ready to conclude an agreement with the Ayatollahs "only if Iran came to the table in a serious way." On April 6, 2015, Obama stated that it would be "a fundamental misjudgment" to precondition an agreement with the Ayatollahs upon the transformation of the nature of their regime. Indeed, the Ayatollahs must come to the table in a serious way for an effective agreement to be concluded - advancing peaceful coexistence, rather than fueling violence.  However, "a serious (peace-driven) way," on the one hand, and the nature of the Ayatollahs, on the other hand, constitutes an oxymoron.   The well-documented nature of the Ayatollahs consists of: Islamic supremacy; violent intolerance of the Christian and Jewish "infidel;" apocalyptic and megalomaniac worldview and policies; worshipping martyrdom/suicide bombing; ruthless domestic repression; hate-education in K-12; sponsorship of global Islamic terrorism; subversion and terrorism against all pro-US Arab regimes; collaboration with all anti-US regimes; nuclear cooperation and co-development of long-range ballistic capabilities with North Korea, a rogue nuclear power; expansion of economic, military, gas and nuclear cooperation with Russia, which collaborates with Iran in Syria and Yemen; undermining the US position in Latin America via the enhancement of economic, military and gas cooperation with Venezuela and Bolivia, which supply uranium to Iran, as well as overall cooperation with Argentina and uranium-rich Ecuador; demonization of the USA in schools, media and mosques - "the Great Satan;" celebration of the November 4 "Death to America Day;" systematic non-compliance with agreements through the art of nuclear concealment, double-talk and deception (Taqiyyah). An effective agreement must not subordinate reliability to desirability. Therefore, the track record of the Ayatollahs should override - and must not be sacrificed on the altar of - the hopes and aspirations of reaching an agreement.  The reality inside the negotiation halls must be determined by – and not conflict with - the reality of Iran's track record outside the negotiation halls.  As pertinent as are the details of an agreement, the details of the Ayatollahs' track record – domestically, regionally and globally - constitute the dominant element which will shape the ripple effects of an agreement: will it promote peaceful coexistence or intensify violence? Short-term political convenience and assessments must be subordinated to long term assessments of the imperialistic goals and rogue foreign and national security policies of the Ayatollahs. An agreement with a rogue regime cannot be effective unless preconditioned upon the dramatic transformation of the nature of the regime. The ethos, mission and long-term vision of the Ayatollahs are reflected most authentically and lucidly in their school textbooks, which were analyzed by the Center for Monitoring the Impact of Peace (CMIP). According to CMIP, which analyzed 115 textbooks, "Hostility towards the USA is apparent everywhere in the textbooks, backed by a set of titles of which 'the Great Satan' is exclusively reserved for the USA…. Iran prepares its school students to fight the West – the US in particular – as an indispensable phase of the Islamic Revolution…. Much emphasis is put on Jihad [Holy War] and martyrdom…. Iran's school system prepares its pupils for World War III in the name of Islam against American world hegemony…. A life-or-death global war against the infidel oppressors….  'O Muslims of the world, you should overcome the fear of death and leverage the passionate and martyrdom-seeking youths…. We shall not cease until the annihilation of all of them (Islamic Viewpoint, Grade 11)'…. 'The exalted God gives eternal Paradise to anyone who becomes a martyr [Islamic Culture and Religious Instruction, Grade 8]…. There is a clear differentiation between Islam and the other monotheistic religions. Islam is considered superior… the only valid religion…. Israel is presented as a base created by Western Colonialism for the control of the Arabs and Muslims [Geography, Grade 11]…."    Unlike the USSR which adhered to the principle of mutual assured destruction (MAD), the apocalyptic worldview of the Ayatollahs – who had no compunction in dispatching 500,000 children to clear minefields during Iran's war against Iraq - considers MAD-driven martyrdom an inducement, a sublime prize. Furthermore, the Ayatollahs believe in the imminent emergence of the 12th (Hidden) Imam, the Mahdi – Muhammad's successor - through apocalyptic events, which could be accelerated via military confrontations, including nuclear. While negotiating with the USA, the Ayatollahs follow core Islamic principles such as the Hudaybiyyah Treaty – which allows Muslims to conclude an agreement, to be abrogated, in order to overcome the "infidel" – and Taqiyyah, which legitimizes deception in the pursuit of Islamic goals. For example, on November 5, 2004, notwithstanding the facts, the current Foreign Minister, Zarif, wrote: "The predominant view among Iranian decision-makers is that possession of nuclear weapons would only undermine Iranian security…. There are also serious ideological restrictions against weapons of mass destruction…. A costly nuclear weapon option would reduce Iran's regional influence and increase its global vulnerabilities." On September 12, 2002, Iran's current President, Rouhani, proclaimed on ABC-TV: "We are not pursuing nuclear, chemical, biological weapons."  On March 21, 2003, the Supreme Ayatollah, Khamenei, stated: "The statement that the Islamic Republic wants to obtain chemical weapons and the atomic bomb is totally false." Against the backdrop of the track record of the Ayatollahs, it would be a well-intentioned fundamental misjudgment – which could lead to a global chaos, including a nuclear war - not to precondition an agreement with the Ayatollahs upon the drastic transformation of the nature of their regime ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 4 and 4a ) AFTER THE FANFARE - FEW ANSWERS, MANY DOUBTS ABOUT OBAMA'S IRAN NUCLEAR "FRAMEWORK" President Obama announced last week that his negotiating team in Lausanne, Switzerland had achieved a "historic understanding with Iran," a basis for a final agreement that would undoubtedly "make our country and the world safer." The President devoted a significant portion of his remarks announcing the "framework agreement" to "the inevitable critics" of the deal and said, "I welcome a robust debate."  A week later, the President may wish he'd been more careful what he asked for. The debate has certainly been robust, but the tough questions have not just been coming from predictable sources - and skepticism seems to be growing, not diminishing. In a Wall Street Journal op-ed (subscriber-only content) former Secretaries of State George P. Schultz andHenry Kissinger review many of the defects in the "framework," before homing in on the fundamental problem, the Obama administration's lack of a coherent strategic approach to the region. For some, the greatest value in an agreement lies in the prospect of an end, or at least a moderation, of Iran's 3½ decades of militant hostility to the West and established international institutions, and an opportunity to draw Iran into an effort to stabilize the Middle East. Having both served in government during a period of American-Iranian strategic alignment and experienced its benefits for both countries as well as the Middle East, we would greatly welcome such an outcome. Iran is a significant national state with a historic culture, a fierce national identity, and a relatively youthful, educated population; its re-emergence as a partner would be a consequential event.   But partnership in what task? Cooperation is not an exercise in good feeling; it presupposes congruent definitions of stability. There exists no current evidence that Iran and the U.S. are remotely near such an understanding. Even while combating common enemies, such as ISIS, Iran has declined to embrace common objectives. Iran's representatives (including its Supreme Leader) continue to profess a revolutionary anti-Western concept of international order; domestically, some senior Iranians describe nuclear negotiations as a form of jihad by other means.   The final stages of the nuclear talks have coincided with Iran's intensified efforts to expand and entrench its power in neighboring states. Iranian or Iranian client forces are now the pre-eminent military or political element in multiple Arab countries, operating beyond the control of national authorities. With the recent addition of Yemen as a battlefield, Tehran occupies positions along all of the Middle East's strategic waterways and encircles archrival Saudi Arabia, an American ally. Unless political restraint is linked to nuclear restraint, an agreement freeing Iran from sanctions risks empowering Iran's hegemonic efforts. The Washington Post's editors worried that Obama's aggressive approach to "selling" his Iran plan at home will lead to his negotiators adopting an even more deferential diplomatic posture as the deadline for an actual agreement gets closer.  By insisting that the deal is already the best available, Mr. Obama is making it more difficult for his negotiators to walk away from the follow-up talks if they are unable to obtain satisfactory terms. If Iran continues to insist on the "immediate" lifting of sanctions, will the president give in rather than reverse his rhetoric? The debate began to take on a surreal quality after the President's stunning admission that ten years into the pact, Iran would be able to easily obtain a full nuclear weapons capacity. Despite subsequent efforts by administration spokespersons to claim the president had misspoken, the remark conceded one of the major points Prime Minister Netanyahu had emphasized in his March 3 speech to Congress. And in the latest bizarre development, Iranian leaders are describing the terms of the deal they supposedly agreed to as "not acceptable." Former Pentagon adviser Michael Rubin said the emerging schisms between Iran and the United States are startling.  "It's become the incredible disappearing deal," Rubin said. The Iranians "have a completely different conception of what was agreed than Kerry and team." This could erode trust between the two sides and complicate the Obama administration's efforts to sell Congress on the agreement, Rubin said. "Obama now asks the United States to embrace a deal that according to the Iranians doesn't permit full inspections, doesn't eliminate plutonium production, provides sanctions relief based on Iranian promises and not behavior, and doesn't eliminate Iran's path to a bomb," Rubin said. "It's a historic deal, but for all the wrong reasons."   FROM ISRAEL - A ROAD MAP TO A BETTER DEAL AND TEN CRITICAL QUESTIONS  changes that the U.S. and our negotiating partners in the P5+1 group could prioritize to secure a better deal. The changes set out by Steinitz include: Barring further Iranian R&D on advanced centrifuges; significantly reducing the number of centrifuges Iran would have available to press back into service if it violates the deal; shuttering the Fordo underground enrichment facility; requiring Iran's compliance in detailing previous nuclear activities with possible military dimensions; shipping its stockpile of lower-enriched uranium out of the country; and ensuring "anywhere, anytime" inspections of Iran's facilities. The Steinitz analysis also identified ten key unanswered questions that must be pursued as negotiators begin to craft the language of a final agreement. Why are sanctions that took years to put in place being removed immediately (as the Iranians claim)? This would take away the international community's primary leverage at the outset of the agreement and make Iranian compliance less likely. Given Iran's track record of concealing illicit nuclear activities, why does the framework not explicitly require Iran to accept inspections of all installations where suspected nuclear weapons development has been conducted? Why can't inspectors conduct inspections anywhere, anytime? Will Iran ever be forced to come clean about its past nuclear weaponization activity? What will be the fate of Iran's stockpile of enriched uranium? Why will Iran be allowed to continue R&D on centrifuges far more advanced than those currently in its possession? Why does the framework not address Iran's intercontinental ballistic missile program, whose sole purpose is to carry nuclear payloads? Following Iranian violations of the framework, how effective will be the mechanism to reinstitute sanctions? What message does the framework send to states in the region and around the world when it gives such far-reaching concessions to a regime that for years has defied UNSC resolutions? Why would this not encourage nuclear proliferation? The framework agreement appears to have much in common with the nuclear agreement reached with North Korea. How will this deal differ from the North Korean case? Why is the lifting of restrictions on Iran's nuclear program in about a decade not linked to a change in Iran's behavior? According to the framework, Iran could remain the world's foremost sponsor of terror and still have all the restrictions removed. Instead, the removal of those restrictions should be linked to a cessation of Iran's aggression in the Middle East, its terrorism around the world and its threats to annihilate Israel." Despite his claim to welcome debate, President Obama has demonstrated his impatience with Israeli concerns and all but accused Prime Minister Netanyahu of craving war with Iran.  Israel's Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon felt compelled to respond. The claim that the only alternative to the framework is war is false. It both obscures the failure to attain better terms from Iran and stifles honest and open debate by suggesting that if you don't agree, you must be a warmonger. It also feeds and reflects the calumny that Israel in particular is agitating for war... The choice is not between this bad deal and war. The alternative is a better deal that significantly rolls back Iran's nuclear infrastructure and links the lifting of restrictions on its nuclear program to an end of Iran's aggression in the region, its terrorism across the globe and its threats to annihilate Israel. This alternative requires neither war nor putting our faith in tools that have already failed us. But an administration that has recently taken to mocking Israelis' alarm over the prospect of a nuclear-capable Iran will not be easily shamed. The President even personally dismissed an idea first advanced by Labor Party leader Isaac Herzog, requiring that Iran recognize Israel's right to exist. The president's statement was interpreted by Zionist Union officials as an attack by the president on their leader, Isaac Herzog. They noted that throughout the campaign, Herzog said he would insist on such recognition. The president's disregard for the concerns of Israelis directly threatened by Iran forced a long-time apologist, Times of Israel correspondent Mitch Ginsburg, to engage in some painful introspection. He titles his personal account of his disillusionment, "How I learned to stop loving Obama and worry about the bomb." ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------