The outstanding deal signed on Tuesday between seemingly nuclear-ambitious Iran and the P5+1 (the United States, Russia, Britain, France, China plus Germany) will radically transform international relations. Additionally, it will most likely curb the disruptive influence of Israel and its influential lobby in the US, particularly the Republicans who now control the Congress.
US President Barack Obama, who scored an unprecedented triumph in this respect, has simultaneously threatened to veto any likely Congressional attempt to block the deal, an obvious warning to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu who been conniving with US Republicans.
This was Obama’s second triumph. He recently re-established diplomatic relations with neighbouring Cuba, described as a landmark “in a legacy of reconciliation with foes that tormented his predecessors for decades”. In a television address on Tuesday, Obama said “history shows that America must lead not just with our might, but with our principles”, adding that “today’s announcement marks one more chapter in our pursuit of a safer, more helpful and more hopeful world”.
British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond told reporters that the deal was about more than just the nuclear issue: “The big prize here is that, as Iran comes out of the isolation of the last decades and is much more engaged with western countries, Iranians hopefully begin to travel in larger numbers again, western companies are able to invest and trade with Iran, there is an opportunity for an opening now.”
US Secretary of State John Kerry, who did most of the bargaining with his Iranian counterpart, Mohmmad Javad Zarif, said persistence paid off. “Believe me, had we been willing to settle for a lesser deal we would have finished this negotiation a long time ago.”
It may not be good for Israel or Israeli politicians such as Netanyahu — who feels, by signing a deal with Iran, “the world is taking away his most beloved toy”, as Haaretz, the liberal Israeli daily, put it.
But Hillary Clinton, the Democratic front-runner who often brags about her support for Israel and its American friends, still described the deal as “an important step that puts the lid on Iran’s nuclear programme”.
Last week she wrote what was described as “a fawning letter” to Hollywood executive Haim Saban, a pro-Israel supporter, inviting him to “work together” to fight the Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement against Israel on college campuses in the US and Europe until it complies with international law and Palestinian rights.
The letter, wrote Roland Nikles in Mondoweiss.net, went on to state that there should be no outside pressure on Israel to solve the Israel-Palestinian conflict and that the conflict should be left to the negotiations between the two parties, adding that comparing Israel and [apartheid-era] South Africa is abhorrent and, of course, that Israel had the right to defend itself “like any other country”.
Peter Beinart, an American political pundit and former editor of the New Republic disagrees with Hillary’s view that the “outcome [of the Israeli-Palesinian conflict] can only be achieved through direct negotiations between Israelis and Palesinians”. Hillary wrote that “it cannot be imposed from the outside by unilateral actions”.
Beinart responds: “This is nonsense. An outcome is being imposed, every day by Israel’s unilateral expropriation of land in the [occupied] West Bank, much of it owned by individual Palestinians, which Israel then doles out to Jewish ... [colonists], thus making a viable ... [Palestinian] state harder and harder to achieve”. He reportedly thinks Hillary’s implicit support of the Israeli occupation and the fight against BDS is counterproductive and bad for Israel.
Beinart believes, according to Nikles, that “Hillary is signalling that she may oppose Obama if he backs a two-state solution at the United Nations this fall. [She implies] that left to their own devices, others in the Obama administration might not have come to Israel’s aid. It all adds up to a hint that if the White House backs a two-state resolution at the Security Council this fall, the woman who says America must “defend Israel at every turn” at the UN will make her opposition known”.
But if Hillary wants to stop the growth of BDS, he writes, she should be thrilled by the prospect of a two-state resolution at the UN. Otherwise, Nikles wonders, “how would she balance her unceasing commitment to Israeli neoconservatives with America’s policy interests in the region as president? There are more questions than answers”.
In others words, Hillary ought to stop shifting and be clear where she stands.
George S. Hishmeh is a Washington-based columnist. He can be contacted at ghishmeh@gulfnews.com
