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United States takes a ‘new path’ forward in the Middle East!

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Foreign Minister Zarif and Secretary of State Kerry shake hands
Foreign Minister Zarif and Secretary of State Kerry shake hands

An historic deal, a giant shift in the US relationship to the Middle East, and there is jubilation around the world.

The Iranian President is proud, restrained, but sees a new way opening for his country.

The White House put out this photo of the president announcing the deal.

Obama announces the historic deal

Just now on MSNBC Chuck Todd said this could be a “crowning achievement” of the Obama administration, though the domestic fallout will be a big problem. Domestic fallout means: the lobby.

The Obama administration is releasing the president’s statement in tweets that are aimed at the skeptics, emphasizing that this is a deal to stop Iranian nukes. But also, joy:

A sense of the moment here:

Kerry just spoke in Geneva.

 

Gharib tweeted this photo of Zarif hugging France’s Laurent Fabius, the strongest advocate for Israel at the talks.

Zarif hugs Fabius
Zarif hugs Fabius

Netanyahu’s twitter account is silent.

Ambassador Ron Dermer, crickets.

Here’s the joint statement from Zarif and Catherine Ashton of the EU. Bland. Though: “Today’s agreement is a significant step towards developing our relationship in a more constructive way.”

Other reaction on twitter:

 

 

A lot of talk about the lobby’s failure

Katrina vanden Heuvel of The Nation says to “ignore Israel’s warnings” (but to trust and verify). She is also jubilant:

  More cracks at the lobby:

Ari Fleischer is going nuts.

More rage from Ari Fleischer.

Jubilation from Zbig Brzezinski:

And a foolish response to Brzezinski from Jeffrey Goldberg:

 

But Goldberg is afraid to criticize the deal. Josh Block of The Israel Project isn’t.


The Washington Institute for Near East Policy is being judicious, uncritical.

More lobby laughs.

 

More jubilation, from Scott Roth, who wrote, This is MOMENTOUS:

 

More about the historic moment:

Omri Ceren says that Parsi’s organization should be registered as a foreign agent, and Jeffrey Goldberg retweets.

This is a calumny. Why? Because unlike AIPAC and the AJC and the ADL, the National Iranian American Council are critics of the Iranian regime.

Now here is a statement from the National Iranian American Council’s Trita Parsi, warning about the opposition that will now arise in the U.S. to the deal. Notice the reference to human rights in Iran.

“Diplomacy has delivered the U.S. and Iran from the brink of a disastrous war and placed the two countries at the beginning of a brighter, more sustainable path forward. NIAC congratulates Presidents Obama and Rouhani, Secretary Kerry and Minister Zarif, and all of the diplomats involved in breaking the paradigm of enmity that have undermined both country’s interests…

“Ultimately, it is the Iranian people and the American people who deserve the most credit. Both are responsible for this initial victory by rejecting defeatists who said that a brighter future was not possible, diplomacy could not succeed, and that the only viable options were antagonism, rejectionism, threats and military contingencies.

“This is the beginning, not the end of the process. The U.S. and Iran must continue vigorously pursuing a long-term agreement that can put the two countries on a sustainable path forward to peaceful relations. Many obstacles and potential spoilers remain. Hardliners in both countries will work harder than ever to sabotage this pivot towards a diplomatic path. Those whose only currency is confrontation will search for any opportunities they can find to undermine and sabotage this interim deal.

“In the U.S. Congress, there are threats to move forward with sanctions that would unravel the delicate diplomatic process and, ironically, likely unravel the international sanctions at the same time. It is imperative that moderates in the U.S. and Iran prevail, and it will take the continued strong support of the American and Iranian people for compromise and negotiation to succeed.

“If this path continues, the biggest winners will be ordinary Americans and ordinary Iranians….

“Iranian Americans, who overwhelmingly oppose war and broad economic sanctions, and who have suffered under the standoff between the two countries, want to see a future in which the U.S. enjoys positive relations with an Iran that truly represents its people. Today, that future appears more possible than ever.

“It is critical that, with negotiations progressing, human rights are made a priority and that meaningful dialogue on human rights is made a centerpiece broader negotiations. Iranian Americans want peace and diplomatic relations between the U.S. and Iran, but such a relationship must also not turn a blind eye to the plight of ordinary people at the hands of their government. Just as is the case with resolving the nuclear issue, diplomacy remains the best tool for advancing human rights.”

J Street, the Israel lobby group that pushed the deal, celebrates it too, and doesn’t mention the hardliners. It’s trying to sell the deal to lovers of Israel:

 

J Street welcomes the agreement reached today in Geneva by the P5+1 and Iran as a significant first step in efforts to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon…

Secretary of State John Kerry, Under Secretary of State Wendy Sherman and their negotiating partners deserve our thanks for their clear-eyed pursuit of a diplomatic resolution, which remains the most desirable way to achieve the shared goal of the US, Israel and all parties with a stake in the security and stability of the Middle East…

We urge Congress to get behind this agreement and continue to give our negotiators the time and space they need to complete a comprehensive and verifiable agreement with Iran that will lift the nuclear threat from the region and the world. Congress should heed President Obama’s call to hold off from enacting new sanctions now so that the international community can test Iran’s sincerity and work to reach a comprehensive agreement with Iran that will lift the nuclear threat from Israel and the world.

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BRADLEY KLAPPER, MATTHEW LEE and JULIE PACE

Secret US-Iran talks set stage for nuke deal

WASHINGTON (AP) — The United States and Iran secretly engaged in a series of high-level, face-to-face talks over the past year, in a high-stakes diplomatic gamble by the Obama administration that paved the way for the historic deal sealed early Sunday in Geneva aimed at slowing Tehran’s nuclear program, The Associated Press has learned.

The discussions were kept hidden even from America’s closest friends, including its negotiating partners and Israel, until two months ago, and that may explain how the nuclear accord appeared to come together so quickly after years of stalemate and fierce hostility between Iran and the West.

…
President Barack Obama personally authorized the talks as part of his effort – promised in his first inaugural address – to reach out to a country the State Department designates as the world’s most active state sponsor of terrorism.

The talks were held in the Middle Eastern nation of Oman and elsewhere with only a tight circle of people in the know, the AP learned. Since March, Deputy Secretary of State William Burns and Jake Sullivan, Vice President Joe Biden’s top foreign policy adviser, have met at least five times with Iranian officials.

http://backchannel.al-monitor.com/index.php/2013/11/7115/exclusive-burns-led-secret-us-back-channel-to-iran/

laura rozen: Burns led secret US back channel to Iran

Deputy Secretary of State William Burns has led a secret U.S. back channel to Iran going back to shortly before the June election of Iranian president Hassan Rouhani, U.S. officials exclusively told Al-Monitor.

The U.S. bilateral channel to Iran was established after the exchange of letters between US President Barack Obama and Iranian President Rouhani in early August, US officials told Al-Monitor. Led by Burns, the US’s second highest ranking diplomat and a former lead US Iran nuclear negotiator, the US effort to establish the direct channel with Iran also includes two officials from the Obama White House: Jake Sullivan, the national security advisor to Vice President Joe Biden, and Puneet Talwar, the National Security Staff senior director for Iran, Iraq, and Persian Gulf affairs, US officials confirmed. Talwar’s role in back channel discussions with Iran was previously reported by the Wall Street Journal.

Following the exchange of letters between Obama and Rouhani in August, “Deputy Secretary of State Bill Burns met bilaterally with Iranian counterparts,” several times over the past few months, starting before the UN General Assembly opening session in September and in Geneva multiple times in recent months, a senior U.S. Administration official told Al-Monitor in an interview late Friday.

(big cut…)

White House press officials have previously deflected queries from Al-Monitor about possible, rumored meetings involving US and Iranian officials. An NSC official suggested to Al-Monitor last week, for instance, in response to a query, that Sullivan could not be part of a meeting with Iranians because he was last week traveling with Biden in Mexico and Panama. Sullivan did not respond to a query from Al-Monitor Saturday.

Similarly, the State Department’s official public schedules have regularly dissembled about Burns’ whereabouts. During both the second and current round of P5+1 Iran nuclear talks in Geneva this month, the State Department schedule said Burns was attending meetings at the White House and State Department, when Al-Monitor has confirmed that he was in fact in Geneva, even in advance of the rest of the US delegation. Those were apparently the instructions of his office to the State Department press officer who puts together the schedules, the official said.

“We thought it important to have these discussions [with the Iranians] discreetly, given the amount of ground we had to cover, lots of it very complicated,” the US official said Friday.

However, the official added, “while in some respects” the US-Iran channel “had to be secretive, it is not a surprise.”

discreetly, as in officials not running back and forth to tel aviv at every turn in the road.

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RE: “An historic deal, a giant shift in the US relationship to the Middle East, and there is jubilation around the world.” ~ Weiss

MY COMMENT: OMG! OMG! OMG! I hope this disastrous news doesn’t cause Senator Kirk to have another stroke.
On second thought . . .

FROM opensecrets.org (10/28/13):

● Pro-Israel: Money to Congress

• Senators (top 10)
• All cycles
Candidate ////// Amount
Lieberman, Joe (I-CT) $2,281,424
Kirk, Mark (R-IL) $1,706,933
Levin, Carl (D-MI) $1,661,835
Specter, Arlen (D-PA) $1,376,605
Obama, Barack (D) $1,371,325
McConnell, Mitch (R-KY) $1,339,348
McCain, John (R-AZ) $1,303,682
Clinton, Hillary (D-NY) $1,234,741
Wyden, Ron (D-OR) $1,058,857
Durbin, Dick (D-IL) $954,203

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RE: “An historic deal, a giant shift in the US relationship to the Middle East, and there is jubilation around the world.” ~ Weiss

HASBARA RESPONSE: Chamberlain! Munich! 1938! Chamberlain! Munich! 1938! Chamberlain! Munich! 1938! Chamberlain! Munich! 1938! Chamberlain! Munich! 1938! Chamberlain! Munich! 1938! Chamberlain! Munich! 1938! Chamberlain! Munich! 1938! Chamberlain! Munich! 1938! [CONTINUED AD NAUSEAM LIKE A BROKEN RECORD]

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RE: “An historic deal, a giant shift in the US relationship to the Middle East, and there is jubilation around the world.” ~ Weiss

MY COMMENT: Over the coming months, look for Israel to attack (temper tantrum-like) either Gaza or Lebanon (or possibly both)! That’s the way Israel operates. It’s some kind of a mental problem.*

* FROM WIKIPEDIA [Megalomania]:

[EXCERPTS] Megalomania is a psychopathological disorder characterized by delusional fantasies of power, relevance, or omnipotence, “Megalomania is characterized by aninflated sense of self-esteem and overestimation by persons of their powers and beliefs.”[1] Historically it was used as an old name for narcissistic personality disorder prior to the latter’s first use by Heinz Kohut in 1968, and is used these days as a non-clinical equivalent.[2][3] . . .
. . . A quotation by Bertrand Russell gives his interpretation of megalomania: “The megalomaniac differs from the narcissist by the fact that he wishes to be powerful rather than charming, and seeks to be feared rather than loved. To this type belong many lunatics and most of the great men of history.”[5]
Russell’s near-contemporary, Sigmund Freud, freely used the same term in a comparable way. Referring with respect to an adult neurotic to ‘the omnipotence which he ascribed to his thoughts and feelings’, Freud reckoned that ‘this belief is a frank acknowledgement of a relic of the old megalomania of infancy’.[6] Similarly Freud concluded that ‘we can detect an element of megalomania in most other forms of paranoic disorder. We are justified in assuming that this megalomania is essentially of an infantile nature and that, as development proceeds, it is sacrificed to social considerations’.[7]
Edmund Bergler, one of his early followers, considered that ‘as Freud and Ferenczi have shown, the child lives in a sort of megalomania for a long period; he knows only one yardstick, and that is his own over-inflated ego….Megalomania, it must be understood, is normal in the very young child’.[8] Bergler was of the opinion that in later life ‘the activity of gambling [“all or nothing” in the case of Likudnik Israel – J.L.D.] in itself unconsciously activates the megalomania and grandiosity of childhood [i.e. the mythical/Biblical “Land of Israel”* – J.L.D.], reverting to the “fiction of omnipotence”.[9]
Otto Fenichel states that, for those who react in later life to narcissistic hurt with denial, ‘ a regression to narcissism is also a regression to the primary narcissistic omnipotence which makes its reappearance in the form of megalomania’.[10] . . .

SOURCE – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megalomania

* SEE: “The Invention of the Land of Israel by Shlomo Sand – review”, By Donald Sassoon, The Guardian, 4/18/13
In this second volume of his trilogy of Jewish studies, Sand explores how the ‘Land of Israel’ was invented, and debunks popular nationalist mythology
LINK – http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2013/apr/18/invention-land-israel-shlomo-sand

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AIPAC’s Blitzer isn’t the only journalist that appear to be crying over the agreement. Their reactions show which ones were on America’s side and which are the Israel-firsters.

One of the important things about the agreement s the indication that the US has broken its reliance on the help of Muslim fundamentalists to get its ways.

Sara Sidner, CNN’s journalist in Abu Dhabi just shifted the distressed look on her face and is now appearing a bit more upbeat about the agreement; must have received a call from Atlanta. Now she has been babbling about Israel’s insecurities and how some Israeli ministers have already come out to say this is a bad deal for Israel.

Regrettably, the US can’t give Israel another “good-for-Israel” one that Netanyahu crowed about when 9-11 happened.

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