Barack Obama has agreed to hold direct talks on Iran’s nuclear program with its leaders, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Is this a surprise? On April 16, 2012, debkafile disclosed that Washington and Tehran were conducting back-channel talks in Paris and Vienna. Obama hopes that a summit will lift his chances of reelection. debkafile: He has so far accepted Iran’s right to enrich uranium, erasing all Israel’s red lines. His last demand is for 24/7 inspections which Tehran refuses.

Instead of Netanyahu attacking Iran, Khamenei has developed a preemptive strategy for harassing Israel without going far enough to provoke an Israel counter-attack. The stealth drone Iran sent over Israel was not only invisible to Israel but also to US Navy and military radar in the region.

Ten days after Hizballah launched an Iranian stealth UAV into Israeli air space undetected, Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu unveiled his new security doctrine in a Knesset speech confirming elections on Jan. 22, 2013. He said that his light but firm finger on the trigger had given Israel seven years without war.
Iran’s leader Khamenei, in contrast, handed Hizballah a $1 m prize for the sending the spy drone in a blatant act of belligerence. He rewarded the Iranian UAV designers with a Porsche car each.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s decision to run for election on the stop-nuclear-Iran ticket opens the door for President Barack Obama, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and Hizballah’s Hassan Nasrallah to put an oar in to determine its results. Obama may seek a breakthrough with Iran to impress the American voter and put a spoke in Netanyahu’s wheel; the Iranian and Hizballah leaders may fabricate a grave security crisis to test Netanyahu with a major predicament in mid-campaign. They are all are playing for high stakes.

Iran is assuming the worst: a) that its plummeting rial is the victim of a Western-Israeli conspiracy to softening the regime up by popular protest ahead of a military attack and b) that their enemies’ agents are manipulating the currency to force Iran to abandon its nuclear aspirations and ...

Israeli reservists drafted at no notice, Air Force, Central Command and other IDF units were flown to Israel’s northern Golan border early Wednesday, Sept. 19, for a surprise IDF exercise under the codename “National Asset.” Since early September, the Israeli Defense Forces have been in the midst of preparations which have the appearance of readiness for a real war rather than an exercise. Those preparations peaked Wednesday under the codename which indicated its goal: the defense of national assets.

Abdullah, 89, functions fully as monarch, prime minister and national policymaker all rolled in one. He has decided to slow down negotiations for a non-aggression pact with Iran because Tehran is in too much of a hurry.

Khamenei hastened to accept the Saudi offer to negotiate a non-aggression pact, using it as a lifeline and new lever for diplomatic maneuvering. But he insists on Saudi Crown Prince Salman visiting Tehran next month as the condition for continuing negotiations.

Some Western intelligence circles suggest that Israel may choose to disable Iran’s nuclear program by eliminating its leaders.

Tehran is sticking to its guns and racing forward toward a nuclear weapon in the face of extreme economic hardship. As Ahmadinejad falls out of favor, former president Rafsanjani begins a comeback.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called a “last war council” of top military chiefs Friday, July 27, ordered Iran's biggest fortification program ever to protect its nuclear sites.

Iran is now going for the nuclear jackpot of weapons-grade enriched uranium after tricking the West into accept its phased advance from 3.5 percent to 20 percent and now 80-90 percent enrichment.

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has often before exploited his many medical problems for manipulation. Although “enjoying” ill health, he is very much in control of affairs of state in the Islamic Republic, although a crop of would-be successors are waiting in the wings for him to go. The radicals have a profound interest in keeping Iran's nuclear program, his pet project, afloat after he is gone, and are exploiting gossip about his ill health to speed matters up.

Obama focuses on obtaining Vladmir Putin’s consent to deploying 5,000 largely Russian monitors in Syria in order to gain a partner also for his Iran nuclear diplomacy. HIzballah risks being cut off from its heavy weapons arsenal hidden in Syria.

Obama has come up with yet another seven-point plan for breaking down Iran’s resistance to abandoning its nuclear weapon aspirations. This time he believes it will work, after obtaining Iran’s consent. Our experts are skeptical.

The Iranian nuclear impasse and the Syrian civil war are more tightly interlinked than ever by President Barack Obama’s decision to cooperate with Moscow for solutions of both - a partnership that promises the eventual three-way carving-up of Middle East influence. The six-month break Israel allowed Obama for diplomatic solutions before exercising its military option, gives Tehran the freedom to defy the six powers in nuclear negotiations and ties US hands against Bashar Assad’s atrocities. Obama's diplomatic path is already cluttered with obstacles.

After three months of exploring every possible diplomatic channel to persuade Iran to give up its nuclear program, Obama enlisted Moscow’s help for getting messages to and from Tehran. But meanwhile his diplomatic network had become a maze in which the Baghdad talks lost their objective.

Delaying an attack on Iran as Barak Obama wants means that Iran will continue to enrich uranium at will. It is already achieving its second goal or diminished sanctions thanks to the concessions offered by the US president.

Israel’s Binyamin Netanyahu and Ehud Barak have decided to stand back for Barack Obama to put his interim deal with Iran to the test, debkafile’s sources report. They are going along with it despite reservations after receiving assurances from the White House that Iranian violations would result in the immediate termination of negotiations and bring military action forward as the sole remaining option for stopping a nuclear Iran. Saturday, debkafile exclusively revealed the eight-point interim deal the US put before Iran.

The Iranian leadership is torn by a serious debate over a preemptive strike on Israel. Supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei fears it will jeopardize his credibility and upend his direct confidential dialogue with Barack Obama. He faces tough opposition from Iran’s war faction.