Barack Obama is winning his Herculean battle to stave off a strike on Iran’s nuclear sites until he is safely reelected in November. His policy of “non-solutions for unseen problems” is working just fine: Iran keeps up its nuclear bomb momentum, and al Qaeda expands its foothold in Egypt, Syria and Yemen. Israel and its military option are shoved out of sight.

DEBKA-Net-Weekly in its latest issue out last Friday analyses Obama’s chances of maintaining this posture for seven months.  To subscribe to DEBKA-Net-Weekly, click here.

On the return flight to Moscow, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov filled in the space left by his Prime Minister Dmitri Medvadev’s silence at the G8 summit Saturday, May 20 with a large dose of skepticism on Iran.
Contradicting President Barack Obama’s statement that diplomacy was preferable to military action, he spoke of “many signals that the military option is… realistic.” Less realistic were NATO decisions on the eurozone and the military exit from Afghanistan at the weekend Chicago summit.

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.

US reservists are put on standby for transfer to the Middle East at 36 hours notice as the Obama administration gets set for a potential midsummer war if Iran stalls on a nuclear accord or fails to deliver on its commitments – or Israel goes to war ...

The Obama administration has invested major diplomatic and military efforts into persuading the Persian Gulf emirs to unite in a federation and mutual defense treaty according to two alternative Saudi blueprints – a NATO or a EU style pact. But those efforts were met with extreme reluctance.

Iran was rattled by the United Arab Emirates air force war games over the Strait of Hormuz in conjunction with the US and France and Israel’s maneuvers in the Mediterranean. Its rejoinder was a maneuver of its own to practice offensive special operations raids for the first ...

Israel’s Defense Minister Ehud Barak warned Thursday 17, that a nuclear Iran would change the whole Middle East landscape and “we must do something to block” what he called “a catastrophe.” The impending agreement would permit Iran “to deceive the world” and continuing building a nuclear bomb. Western diplomatic sources disclose that Iran has moved this process forward by starting in mid-negotiations to instal new centrifuge cascades at Fordo to double or triple near-weapons grade enriched uranium production.

The 60 Iranian experts employed by 11 different Iranian agencies controlled by the Iranian Defense Ministry (under the IRGC) were revealed by names and addresses Saturday, May 12, by the opposition Mujahedin-e Khalq (MEK/PMOI) in the first ever detailed exposure of a highly secret, central Iranian organization working on building a nuclear weapon. debkafile: Through the secret US-Iranian track, Khamenei told Barack Obama that Fordow will not be shut down. Jerusalem: The evolving US-Iran deal is “bad for Israel.”

Iran’s latest proposals contain a couple of concessions but are essentially a bargaining vehicle for using its clandestine dialogue with the US for acceptance of its nuclear program in one form another but equally important recognition as America’s respected regional partner.

Binyamin Netanyahu, freed from the shackles of an election campaign, is more empowered by his new expanded coalition tackling Iran’s nuclear threat by military measures. The Obama administration must think up new devices for holding him down.

While US officials are upbeat about the prospects of Tehran’s willingness to strike a deal on its nuclear aspirations, Israel sees Iran forging ahead with the concealment of its suspect nuclear sites in “zones of immunity.”

The unity government which Binyamin Netanyahu formed Tuesday May 8, is not just the broadest coalition ever to govern Israel, but also the first with three former chiefs of staff who are fully capable of directing an attack on Iran.  It was this feature which caught Washington’s attention as the first reports of Netanyahu’s stunning U-turn away from an early election filtered through. All the same, US sources expect the new government to give Obama a few months’ space before a decision on Iran.
 

Continuing our exclusive blow-by-blow reporting since March on the backdoor nuclear negotiations between Washington and Tehran, the latest DEBKA-Net-Weekly out Friday revealed that Iran has put together a new package of proposals ahead of the next formal session between Iran and the Six Powers in Baghdad on May 23. They affect its nuclear program and aim to test Barack Obama’s willingness for a strategic partnership in the Persian Gulf region.
To subscribe to DEBKA-Net-Weekly, click here.

Two stalwarts of the Western confrontation against a nuclear-armed Iran suffered election defeats this week: Nicolas Sarkozy was swept out of the Elysee by the Socialist leader Francois Hollande Sunday, May 6. Three days earlier, the two parties forming UK Prime Minister David Cameron’s government coalition were trounced in local elections across Britain.  Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, who faces an election in four months, never imagined he would so soon be left on shifting sands against the Iranian nuclear threat.

Iran has transferred nuclear weapon-making installations to secret Dasht e-Kavir (Great Salt Desert) sites, including nuclear-capable ballistic missile plants, debkafile reports. This prompted Israel’s Defense Minister Ehud Barak’s prediction that Iran is on the way to a capability for building a nuclear bomb in 60 days. To keep the desert installations out of sight, Tehran is bidding to stop IAEA inspections altogether after Parchin. Binyamin Netanyahu and Ehud Barak are fighting to keep Israel’s military option on the table against political rivals at home.

 

The US military buildup around Iran goes far beyond a cautionary demonstration for Iran to give up its nuclear weapon program. As well as the second lot of Raptors for the Gulf, military might is pouring into the two strategic islands of Masirah and Socotra.

Iran is satisfied that Washington has made substantial concessions on its nuclear program and more can be squeezed persuaded for the sake of Tehran’s assistance for resolving the crises in Afghanistan and Iraq.

The government has tabled a bill for dissolving the Knesset. The date is still not confirmed, but would-be candidates for seats at the post-election cabinet table are lining up.  Defense Minister Ehud Barak launched his bid to carry on in defense at a news conference Wednesday, May 2. Other bidders, on the assumption that Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu will head the next government, aim to cut Likud’s current right-wing and religious partners out of his coalition and push Likud into a centrist role.

Yuval Diskin has a point about an Israeli attack’s potential for halting Iran’s race for a nuclear bomb – but not when he argues it would accelerate that race. Without an Israeli attack Tehran doubled the pace of its nuclear development in the past year. It is important to examine the ex-Shin Bet’s motives for echoing left-wing rhetoric against current Israeli leaders - especially as most Israeli left-of-center parties and protest groups are funded by foreign political interests.