There is nothing new in hearing talk that Iran is trying to develop its military nuclear program, and there is nothing new in the talk about western countries' attempt to stiffen up sanctions on Iran because of this presumed program. The same goes for the talk that Israel is threatening to bomb Iranian nuclear facilities.
However, there is a new element, with the growing media campaign and military threats against Iran, which are coincide with the issuing of a report by the International Atomic Energy Agency, expected tomorrow. These developments come at a time the entire region is undergoing a big strategic change, just as Iran is experiencing a profound political and economic crisis at home, even though it is being suppressed for now. The climate in the Middle East has changed since the beginning of 2006, when Iran announced that it had carried out its first process of uranium enrichment. This was followed by the first wave of economic sanctions, imposed by the United States on Iran at the end of that year, and were toughened up in 2007, 2008 and 2010. Moreover, the situation in Iran has also changed, especially since the era of President Mohammad Khatami, when its nuclear program enjoyed domestic consensus and Iran dealt with the issue with considerable wisdom and diplomacy, both regionally and internationally.
In discussing the new climate in the Middle East, it is important to note that the campaign against Iran, which arose from leaked information about the IAEA report to the Washington Post, is coinciding with the political and media siege that is being experienced by Iran's chief ally in the region, Syria, because of its bloody crackdown against protestors. Thus, it is not strange for the Iranian regime to consider this campaign part of an attack against "pro-resistance" forces in the region, and accuse the IAEA of having become a tool of the US to be used against Iran. The Syrian regime has done the same, in terms of its stance on Arab and western calls for Damascus to settle its problem with the opposition and stop killing dissidents. The Syrians have responded by accusing these countries of being tools in the service of a policy aimed at striking against Syrian unity and its pan-Arab stance!
However, the shortest and best way to confronting such a policy, if it exists, is for Iran and Syria to take the initiative and engage in more transparency as they deal with matters, whether this involves the IAEA or the opponents of the Syrian regime. Iran, for example, should permit the IAEA to visit all of its nuclear facilities, especially since it claims that its reactors are for generating electricity, and for medical purposes. The IAEA will no longer be forced to rely on leaked intelligence reports, as in the latest report. These reports then turn out to be correct, showing that Iran is hiding more than it is revealing about its nuclear program.
The same goes for Syria, which can respond to the "suspicious" campaign by responding to the Arab League initiative. The crackdown would stop and the regime would take part in true dialogue with its opponents, to arrive at a solution to the crisis. This would defeat the pretexts for any Western policy that Damascus believes is targeting it.
The Israeli threats against Iran have no goal in such a climate other than boosting the argument by the Iranian regime and its allies in the region that they constitute the formidable "resistance" to the "Zionist entity." It is an invaluable card to play at a time in which Iran and its allies face domestic difficulties, especially since Israeli experts themselves are agreed that Tehran is aware of the destructive danger to the future of the Islamic Revolution posed by any threat against Israel.
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