The insinuation here that that the proposed U.S. – Iranian negotiations will hold
temporarily an Israeli attack on Iranian nuclear facilities, and that Israel wants a “time limit” after which it can attack Iran, is Israel’s “saber rattling” that has not intimidated Iran. Armed with the latest S-300 Russian anti-aircraft batteries that the U.S. air force generals have admitted is hard to defeat, and thousands of its own missiles that can reach Israel, Iran is not getting any indigestion with Israeli threats. And if Israel couldn’t defeat the Lebanese Hezbollah after a 68 days of bombing in 2006, or Hamas recently after it turned Gaza into rubble, its threats on Iran are a scarecrow that won’t fly.

Recently, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu told an Israeli newspaper that “if Iran
is forced to scrap its nuclear program, its rising power status will wane, and that will diminish the power of Hezbollah and Hamas, and Israel can live in peace.” And that is the bottom line of both the U.S. and Israeli objectives on the Iran nuclear program issue: “Keep Iran weak and insignificant militarily, so
it can cannot become a key player in the Middle East politics.” But Iran has been there after the CIA overthrow of Mohammad Mossadegh in 1953, and it is certainly not going back into that cage.

As for the U.S. State Department claim that “Iran is not interested in serious negotiations,” that is absolutely correct – if “serious negotiations” mean that Iran will give up its nuclear program. Iran has made it clear more than 100 times that its nuclear program is peaceful, and “negotiations” with the western powers will be held only to help them “understand it,” not how to scrap it!

Now, with the U.S. and Israel, on one side [the European allies are just towed along - a European poll on January 19, 2009 (Reuters) found that 59% of Europeans saw U.S. leadership as "undesirable"], and Russia and China opposing it to limit U.S. influence in Middle East and elsewhere, the Obama new approach on Iran is destined to failure. And it is not because “the international community is threatened by Iran,” but because the U.S. and Israeli freedom to act militarily in the Middle East is threatened as Iran is becoming a rising Middle East power that other players have to reckon with.

Would the U.S. opt for a military option against Iran if all else fails? In January 30, 2003 (ABC News) Nelson Mandela said before the U.S. invasion of Iraq: “One power with a president that has no foresight and cannot think properly is now wanting to plunge the world into a holocaust.” The person “who could not think properly” was George Bush. On January 18, 2009
a CNN poll justified Nelson Mandela with 68% of American said George Bush presidency was “a failure, and he was a “good riddance.” Three days earlier, on January 15, 2009, the British Foreign Secretary to the British newspaper Guardian that “The U.S. cannot kill its way out of the threats it faces.” I hope Obama re-define his word “change” because changing “style”
only will not get him far.

I also hope Obama has learned something from the disastrous 8 years of George Bush. If not, he might follow George Bush in the “good riddance” page of the U.S. presidential history. Nikos Retsos, retired professor