Iran Says It Will Ban Americans From Nuclear Inspections

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) — Iran will not allow American or Canadian inspectors working for the U.N. nuclear watchdog to visit its nuclear facilities, an official said in remarks broadcast by state TV on Thursday.

Deputy Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said Iran will only allow inspectors from countries that have diplomatic relations with it. The previously undisclosed remarks were made during a Sunday meeting with parliamentarians.

"American and Canadian inspectors cannot be sent to Iran," said Araghchi. "It is mentioned in the deal that inspectors should be from countries that have diplomatic relations with Islamic republic of Iran."

He also said inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency will not have access to "sensitive and military documents."

Iran and world powers reached a historical deal earlier this month aimed at curbing Tehran's disputed nuclear program in exchange for the lifting of international sanctions. Western nations have long suspected Iran is pursuing nuclear weapons alongside its civilian atomic program, allegations denied by Tehran, which insists its nuclear activities are entirely peaceful.

The U.S. and Iran severed diplomatic relations after the 1979 Islamic revolution and the hostage crisis at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. Canada closed its embassy in Tehran and suspended diplomatic relations in 2012.

Via: Yahoo News

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Is Iran luring Obama into a trap in Iraq?

Bloomberg View’s Eli Lake and Josh Rogin recently reported that U.S. troops are sharing a base with Iran-backed Shiite militias in Iraq, where Tehran’s notorious proxies are spying on U.S. operations and personnel at their leisure to prepare the ground for future crimes. This worrying revelation is the latest manifestation of a misconception about the Iranian regime’s nature and its intentions in Iraq -- an error that can prove to be fatal if not corrected.

In his interviews with different media outlets, U.S. President Barack Obama has made assertions about the Iranian regime being able to become a successful regional power and help stabilize the Middle East. Also, in his secret missives to the Iranian regime’s Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Obama has promised that in the event of a final accord on Iran’s contested nuclear program, the U.S. is willing to cooperate with Iran in the fight against the Islamic State, an extremist group that is rampaging through the Middle East and has cut itself a caliphate out of territory straddling Iraq and Syria.

The assumption that Tehran can help in the fight to counter the advances of the IS stems from the shortsighted thinking that as a Shiite extremist powerhouse, the Iranian regime is the archenemy of the Sunni extremist Islamic State.

But a quick review of Iran’s actions in recent years proves that Tehran’s foreign policy in the region is not based on ideological tenets, but rather on setting up short-term -- and sometimes contradictory -- alliances to further its ultimate end: keeping the Middle East in a state of instability in order to remain the main power broker and hegemon of the region.

Via: American Thinker

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Col. Ralph Peters: The Triumph of Failure - Obama’s Disastrous Foreign Non-Policy

 When an American president evidently dislikes our national heritage, distrusts capitalism and despises Israel, we might expect a troubled foreign policy. But the consistently naïve, occasionally vicious and thoroughly incompetent set of confused initiatives masquerading as a foreign policy under this administration amount to a catastrophe.

It takes a sort of genius to get the entire world completely wrong.

The simplest way to critique the Obama administration’s inept overseas efforts is just to list the failures. Set aside the tawdry efforts of this timid president to portray himself as the bold commander-in-chief who all but dispatched bin Laden with his bare hands (were the SEALs even there?). There’s enough of a mess without that stolen valor:

Iran: We’ve spent four years talking. Tehran’s spent four years pursuing nuclear weapons. When brave Iranians challenged their oppressors in the street, begging for “hope and change,” our president cowered in silence, protecting his cherished “strategy” of negotiations with a regime that kills Americans and wants all Israelis dead. The ayatollahs’ thugs crushed the uprising.

Predictably, negotiations failed. Now we’re told that sanctions are the answer. But there’s zero chance that Iran’s leaders will abandon their nuke program. If they did, their domestic authority would collapse. (I believe that this administration has privately accepted that Iran will get nukes.)

Israel: An election-eve military exercise can’t compensate for four years of disdain. As our president made clear in his iniquitous Cairo speech, he regards Israelis and Palestinian terrorists as, at best, morally equivalent. Obama deems Israel not an ally, but a nuisance. Want to understand this man’s antipathy to Israel? Study the sermons of the president’s old Chicago pastor, which mirror the Muslim Brotherhood’s view of the world.

Libya: While the Bush administration failed to plan for a post-Saddam Iraq, the Obama gang refused to plan for a post-Khadafy Libya. Turning the situation over to leftists in the State Department — who prefer local thugs to US Marines — Obama slighted the secular elements who reflect at least some of our values. Now al Qaeda’s embedded in a country where it never had a presence. And four Americans are dead.

Egypt: Our president has shown more understanding toward the Muslim Brotherhood now ruling Egypt than toward Israel’s truly democratic government and Prime Minister Netanyahu. And we’re still subsidizing the Egyptian military.

Via: New York Post

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Ahmadinejad Predicts Downfall Of America Because Of $16 Trillion Debt…

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad predicted the impending downfall of the "US empire," blaming the collapse on a combination of the country's massive debt and its loss of legitimacy within the international community, Iran's official news agency IRNA reported Thursday.

“How long can a government with a $16 trillion foreign debt remain a world power?” he asked at a press conference with Kuwaiti media personnel. "The Americans have injected their paper wealth into the world economy and today the aftermaths and negative effects of their pseudo-wealth have plagued them.”

He added: “An empire, or a government, remains in power so long as the people under its power support it, but today the Americans have acted in a way that the world nations do not like them at all, and therefore, their international legitimacy is annihilated.”

Ahmadinejad also predicted that the West would soon drop their alliance with the "Zionist regime," saying that Westerners and US politicians are increasingly "at a loss" as to why Israel exists.

Downplaying the effect of Western sanctions on the Iranian economy, Ahmadinejad said that the Islamic Republic would persevere. "The hegemonic powers have no way [forward], but to change the conditions.” Earlier this month, riots broke out in Tehran in protest of the collapse of the rial currency, which has lost some two-thirds of its value against the dollar in the past 15 months, stoking inflation that is now running at around 25 percent.

Via: JPost

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Israel leader says US may not act against Iran

JERUSALEM (AP) — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insinuated in an interview published Friday that Israel cannot entirely rely on the U.S. to act against Iran's suspect nuclear program, a sign that the Israeli leader is not backing down from the sharp rhetoric that strained relations this week with the Obama administration.

Netanyahu has been arguing in recent weeks that Iran is getting close to acquiring nuclear weapons capability, a claim Iran denies. He has been pushing the U.S. to commit to the circumstances under which the U.S. would lead a strike on Iran's nuclear facilities. Netanyahu and other Israeli leaders have repeatedly hinted that if the United States does not attack, Israel will.

"I hear those who say we should wait until the last minute. But what if the U.S. doesn't act? It's a question that must be asked," Netanyahu told Israel Hayom, in an interview marking the Jewish New Year.

The paper, a free mass-circulation daily, is funded by Netanyahu's billionaire Jewish-American supporter Sheldon Adelson.

The Obama administration also suspects Tehran is seeks to become a nuclear power and says it is committed to preventing a nuclear Iran, but insists more efforts must be made before resorting to military action. Washington is refusing to be specific about what exactly would necessitate a strike on Iran and has rejected an Israeli demand for "red lines" that cannot be crossed.

Earlier this week Netanyahu issued a rebuke of the U.S. cautious stance, perceived as an indirect swipe at the Obama administration. He said that "those in the international community who refuse to put red lines before Iran don't have a moral right to place a red light before Israel."

Via: Chron

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Netanyahu To Obama: ‘Wait For What? Wait Until When?’

WASHINGTON (CBSDC/AP) — Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is making it clear that Israel will not wait to take out Iranian nuclear facilities.

In heated comments toward the United States, the Israeli prime minister said that it’s becoming clear that diplomacy will not work with Iran.

“The world tells Israel, `Wait. There’s still time,’” Netanyahu said Tuesday, according to The Associated Press. “And I say: `Wait for what? Wait until when?’ Those in the international community who refuse to put red lines before Iran don’t have a moral right to place a red light before Israel.”

The Obama administration has consistently stated that they don’t want to go the military route against Iran and give more time for the sanctions to force Tehran to give up its nuclear ambitions.

Netanyahu worries Iran will continue developing nuclear technology without giving the Islamic nation a firm timeline to stop.

“If Iran knows that there is no deadline, what will it do? Exactly what it’s doing. It’s continuing, without any interference, towards obtaining nuclear weapons capability and from there, nuclear bombs,” he said, according to Haaertz.

Defense Minister Ehud Barak tried to downplay the harsh rhetoric, saying in a statement to Haaertz that the tension between the U.S. and Israel should be ironed out “behind closed doors.”

The Israeli paper also reports that the White House denied Netanyahu’s request to visit President Obama at the end of this monDCth.

Via: CBS DC

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