Jerusalem Report – 06/08/2018 – Iran, Israel – War Rhetoric

There may be a lull in the missile lobbing, but both sides of the Mideast conflict – Iran and Israel – are taking this time to prepare.

Read while you listen!

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Kimberly Rogers-Brown
BeastWatchNews.com

Theme music by Mishkanim.


IRAN SAYS FIGHTERS WON’T LEAVE SYRIA DESPITE RUSSIA’S DEAL WITH ISRAEL

A top Iranian military official has said that his country’s troops will not withdraw from Syria, despite reports that Russia and Israel have reached a deal for Iranian militias to retreat from southern Syria.

Reports last week claimed that Russia and Israel had reached a deal that would see Iranian militia fighters retreat at least 15 miles from the border separating Syria and Israel. Moscow had called for all non-Syrian fighters to move away from Israel’s borders in order to quell fighting between Israel and Iranian militias.  

“Unlike the American military forces and the regional reactionaries, the Iranian advisers are present in Syria at the request of the Syrian government and people,” Brig.-Gen. Massoud Jazayeri, an adviser to Chief of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces said. 

According to Jazayeri, “The Zionist regime’s greatest fear is the proximity of Muslim fighters near its border; it has come to pass.”

He is exactly right. Israel has long feared the presence of Iran military and militias close to its border. This situation is a direct result of the deal President Donald Trump made with President Vladmir Putin in June 2016. Trump dealt directly with Putin and without advice from his Cabinet or Pentagon.

Russia has not upheld its deal with Trump even though the U.S. has upheld its side of Trump’s deal to date, so why is there an expectation that Russia will do so now? According to this same report, Iran appears determined to maintain a long-term presence in the country regardless of what the Russians say.

This is all very disingenuous because Russia makes deals knowing their ally, Iran, will do what they plan, but all the while putting on the appearance of trying real hard to make peace. That’s a long way of the Russian government is a pack of liars!

Neither Israel or Syria will be deterred in their drive to increase the size of their armories. Israel’s new ground-to-ground missile force will continue to receive funding to the tune of $2 billion over the next 10 years. 

Israeli made the decision to create the new force in early January 2018. The unit was said to be part of the army’s ground forces and will operate surface-to-surface missiles with a range of 300 kilometers (186 miles). The funding figures originate from unnamed sources. 

This new system was launched because of the failures of the American M270 MLRS, or Multiple Launch Rocket System, that did not meet Israel’s operational needs. No one knows where the MLRS fell short, but the Israeli version can only reach distances of 70 km. Israel’s new missile unit will have an extended range of 150 kilometers and the surface-to-surface missiles will have a range of 300 kilometers. 

Israel’s new missiles have already been put to use. Syria claimed that Israel’s new surface-to-surface missiles were already used against their forces in the series of strikes by Israel that began an hour after US President Donald Trump pulled out of the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement. 

Vladimir Kozhin, Russia’s foreign aid adviser, said that the Kremlin had no plan to outfit Syria with more S-300 anti-air defense systems, despite the heavy speculation they were planning to do so. A delivery of S-300s had arrived a month prior to the Israeli missile attack. 

However, Russia may be changing its mind about more S-300 deliveries. Right now, the Russian government says Syria has everything it needs to defend itself, but taking into consideration the strikes by the US, France and the UK in April, Russia said it reserves the right to do whatever it deems necessary regarding supplying more missiles to Syria. 

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad said he still plans on beefing up Syria’s air defenses.

NATO CHIEF: ALLIANCE WON’T DEFEND ISRAEL IN WAR WITH IRAN

NATO has weighed in on its stance with Israel, saying it will not side with Israel in the case of an Iranian attack. Israel is not a member of the 29 nation alliance, so there is no agreement to help Israel in case of attack. Israel’s relationship with NATO is defined as a “partnership.” 

Part of the problem is that Turkey, a member of NATO since 1952, objected to Israel being part of the Mediterranean Dialogue after Israeli-Turkish ties soured six years ago. Following Turkish-Israeli reconciliation in 2016, Ankara withdrew its longstanding veto against Israel being accepted as a partner nation to the organization, and Jerusalem opened its first ever diplomatic mission to NATO headquarters in Brussels. 

In the face of Russia’s growing military presence in the eastern Mediterranean, especially in Syria, NATO’s strategic interest in the region is increasing – as is Israel’s importance to the alliance, so NATO’s hard line statement this week may change.

It wouldn’t surprise me at all if NATO didn’t change its mind.

Ezekiel 38:4  And I will turn thee back, and put hooks into thy jaws, and I will bring thee forth, and all thine army, horses and horsemen, all of them clothed with all sorts of armour, even a great company with bucklers and shields, all of them handling swords:

Gog comes into Israel with a “great company”. Well, all these military exercises that Israel is participating in with NATO constitutes a “great company”. NATO doesn’t even have to be an occupying force when Iran attacks Israel. NATO can just come to the aid of Israel and the U.S. who does have any occupying force in Israel now. Remember, the U.S. and NATO do have a military engagement treaty with one another.

AMID RISING TENSION WITH IRAN, ISRAEL TO JOIN LARGEST INT’L NAVY EXERCISE

In face of rising tensions with Iran, Israel will participate – for the first time – in the biennial Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) multinational naval exercise led by the US 3rd fleet off of the coast of Hawaii and Southern California later this month. 

RIMPAC is the world’s largest international maritime exercise. It will be held from June 27 to August 2nd and will include 26 nations, 47 surface ships, five submarines, 18 national land forces, and more than 200 aircraft and 25,000 personnel. 

The theme of RIMPAC 2018 is “Capable Adaptive Partners,” meaning the drill will work to increase multi-national cooperation and trust as well as enhance interoperability of troops. According to the US Navy RIMPAC will focus on a wide range of capabilities “critical to ensuring the safety of sea lanes and security on the world’s oceans” with drills ranging from disaster relief to counter-piracy, mine clearance operations, air defense exercises to complex maritime warfare.

Do you see the “great company” spoken of in Ezekiel 38:4? The idea of the “interoperability of troops” means creating a legion of troops from various nations that each nation can trust in case one needs help. How many of those 26 nations will come to Israel’s rescue when Iran attacks? Not all of them, but enough to fulfill the prophecy of a “great company” being with Gog when it happens.

Israel will be joining other first-time participants Brazil, Sri Lanka and Vietnam. Other countries participating in RIMPAC 2018 are Australia, Brunei, Canada, Chile, Colombia, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand, Peru, South Korea, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Tonga and the United Kingdom.

The combined live field training exercise will include tactical level and limited operational level training and will feature live firing of a Long Range Anti-Ship Missile (LRASM) from a US Air Force aircraft, surface to ship missiles by the Japan Ground Self-Defense Force, and a Naval Strike Missile (NSM) from a launcher on the back of a Palletized Load System (PLS) by the US Army. 

While Israel’s Navy is relatively small compared to other IDF corps it has a significant amount of territory to protect since the expansion of the country’s exclusive economic zone (EEZ) from 40 miles to 150 miles four years ago. 

Israel regularly participates in naval exercises with the United States such as the trilateral Noble Dina exercise between the US, Israeli and Greek navies as well as a joint IDF Special Forces and US Marines military exercise in the Negev Desert dubbed ‘Noble Shirley,’ which involved special units from the Israeli Air Force, Navy and ground forces. 

Israeli Navy’s Salvage and Underwater Missions Unit also held a wide-ranging two-week drill in Haifa dubbed “Noble Melinda” with its counterparts from the US and France where the three navies drilled on scenarios involving naval mines, underwater demolitions and sea-based terror attacks. 

China was uninvited from participating due to its ongoing militarization of the disputed Spratly Islands in the South China Sea.

Therein lies another problem. The United States has now shut out its long time military games partner. You know what happens when “friends” shut out “friends”? Let me tell you – BAD things!

MORTARS, ROCKETS FIRED FROM GAZA

Some of the dozens of mortars and rockets fired into Israel by Gaza-based terrorists on Tuesday were made in Iran and smuggled into the Strip, Israel’s army said. 

Israel and Egypt’s blockade appears to have been ineffective in preventing Iran from smuggling in those arms. The IDF’s revelation that Gaza terror groups are using Iranian-made rockets came after the new Hamas Gaza leader said last month it had restored relations with Iran and was gearing up for future hostilities with Israel.

One element of the Iranian attack on Israel to come is the swiftness with which it will happen. Only a month ago, Iran and Hamas patched up relations. Now, Hamas already has Iranian rockets! Yahya Sinwar told reporters that Iran is now the largest backer financially and militarily of Hamas’s armed wing. He further said, “Hamas is accumulating military power in preparation for a battle for “the liberation of Palestine” and “we are not afraid of a war and are ready for it.”

Oh yeah! Israel’s time of trouble is coming!

Iran has been arming Hezbollah in the north for decades. It is now arming Gaza and the Palestinians in the West bank. When Iran attacks Israel, it will be a cooperative effort including Hamas in Gaza and the Palestinians in the West bank to put a squeezing affect on Israel’s military.

Iran coming from the north and Hamas and the PA coming from the west and east will do more than just keep the IDF busy, it may well cause a panic throughout the country.

The Iranian bragging continues, “Every day we build missiles and continue military training,” Sinwar added, saying that “thousands of people were working “day and night” to prepare for the next conflict”.

Israel will suffer under a military “squeeze” just like Saudi Arabia who will also be attacked at the same time. The “squeeze” for the Saudis will be the Iranian-Syrian attack from the north while the Houthis in Yemen attack from the south.

Iran and Hamas had a departing of the ways over backing Iran’s close ally, Syrian President Bashar Assad, in his country’s civil war. The reason is clear. Hamas are Sunnis. Bashar Assad is a Shi’ite Alawite. But Iran is a Shi’ite nation, too. So why would Sunni Hamas and Shi’ite Iran be allies? The Sunnis and Shi’ites truly hate each other!

The answer lies in the fact that their mutual enemy is Israel. The enemy of my enemy is my friend. But, what Hamas and the PA do not realize is that once Iran has conquered Israel, it will no longer need Hamas or the PA – they won’t be friends anymore because there won’t be anymore common enemy.

Last Spring, when Hamas went to Iran to patch up relations with Tehran, they met with Iran’s leaders of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps that answers directly to Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Just like what has happened in Syria, where President Bashar Al-Assad now answers to the IRGC because of all the help Syria has received from Iran in their war of the last 8 years, Hamas has just put itself under the command of the IRGC. So when the IRGC pulls the string, Hamas will be their puppet.

During the Hamas delegation’s visit in Tehran, Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said the Palestinian issue remained a top foreign policy priority for his government, which was “ready to put aside all disagreements [with Hamas] for the sake of supporting Palestine and the Palestinian people as well as the unity of the Muslim world.”

I’ve said for years that the Palestinian issue is nothing more than an excuse for an upcoming war with Israel. Iran, the Persians, couldn’t care less about the Palestinian issue except for the reason it will give them to attack Israel. In the attack on Israel, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Libya and Ethiopia will also be attacked. Iran will make a clean sweep of all the ruling Sunni nations in the southern Middle East. This is what the coming war really is all about.

To rule over the Sunnis from a Shi’ite Caliphate has been the dream of the Shi’ites since Mohammed died almost 1400 years ago.

Dan 7:7  After this I saw in the night visions, and behold a fourth beast, dreadful and terrible, and strong exceedingly; and it had great iron teeth: it devoured and brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with the feet of it: and it was diverse from all the beasts that were before it; and it had ten horns. 

Dan 7:8  I considered the horns, and, behold, there came up among them another little horn, before whom there were three of the first horns plucked up by the roots: and, behold, in this horn were eyes like the eyes of man, and a mouth speaking great things. 

This Beast in Daniel 7:7-8 is the Roman Empire, but it was this empire that spawned the creation of Islam – the ten horns. The 10 horns are the Caliphates that have already existed in history to date. Three of those horns were plucked up.

In the history of Islam, 3 Shi’ite Caliphates arose and were very short lived and were “plucked up”, as it were, by the Sunnis. The Sunnis ruled all 10 Caliphates.

The text says that “BEFORE” the little horn came up, there had been three others like it. Iran’s coming Caliphate is the little horn of Daniel that arises out of the twistedness of the Roman Beast.

NETANYAHU’S EUROPEAN VISIT

Meanwhile, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has kicked off a three-day visit to Europe, where he is lobbying Germany, France and the U.K. to pull out of the Iran nuclear deal and sideline Tehran. 

Netanyahu used a fear tactic on these European nations telling Germany’s Angela Merkel Monday that Iranian meddling in the Middle East could touch off another new refugee flow to Europe. 

Netanyahu said that Tehran has been able to bankroll its growing military presence in Syria and Yemen because sanctions had been lifted in exchange for its halt in nuclear enrichment activities. 

Iran wants to “basically conduct a religious campaign in largely Sunni Syria but try to convert Sunnis,” he said at a joint press conference with Merkel.

“This will inflame another religious war — this time a religious war inside Syria and the consequences will be many, many more refugees and you know where exactly they will come,” he said. 

More than one million asylum seekers, with Syrians making up the biggest group, have arrived in Germany since 2015, creating deep new political divisions in the country and shrinking Merkel’s ruling majority in her fourth term. 

All three countries have vowed to try to salvage the hard-fought accord since President Donald Trump announced the US withdrawal from it last month. They argue it is the best way to head off a regional arms race and have vowed with Russia and China, the two other signatory countries, to keep it alive. 

Merkel insisted that the Europeans and Israel were “united by the goal that Iran must never get a nuclear weapon” but acknowledged deep differences with Netanyahu on “how we can best achieve this”. 

She defended the nuclear accord as ensuring “at least for a certain time, that Iran’s activities are under control” noting that Tehran had been “on the brink of having a nuclear weapon” before the deal was signed. 

But she acknowledged that a supplementary deal with Tehran covering its ballistic missile program as well as its interventions in countries such as Lebanon, Syria, Iraq and Yemen was needed. “But we believe that this can be achieved with tough negotiations,” she said.

The failure of tough negotiations could result in more of a “great company” joining Gog in Israel.

Asked about Iranian supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei comments on Twitter Sunday calling Israel a “malignant cancerous tumour”, Merkel said Germany and its partners had “repeatedly and with great clarity told Iran that we will stand up for Israel’s right to security”.

If you listen well, you can hear the sound of money behind every one of Angela Merkel’s words.

Netanyahu wasn’t talking about the money that can be made by keeping Iran’s nuclear development in line. He was talking about the danger Iran’s nuclear developments pose to Israel and warned that Tehran will soon use its uranium enrichment program to destroy Israel.  

So far, international inspectors say that Iran has not violated its end of the agreement, but the country is warning that it will stop abiding by the terms of the deal if the international community doesn’t offer an alternative.   

Nevertheless, some experts argued that a war between Iran and Israel is not imminent.

“What’s going on now is that there is a propaganda campaign. Iran is trying to pressure the Europeans to come up with a compensation for the U.S. pulling out. So far they have done nothing that violates the agreement. As for Netanyahu, he has been beating this drum for over 20 years. So we’re still in a messaging and propaganda phase. But if in a month or two all European countries have pulled out of Iran and aren’t buying Iranian oil, then they might re-start the nuclear program,” Barbara Slavin, director of the Future of Iran program at the Atlantic Council, told Newsweek. 

“Netanyahu enjoys having Iran as a foil. He is also controversial at home and an endangered politician, so it’s always useful to have an external enemy. He wants to put the blame on Iran, but the blame is on the United States and those who pressured the U.S. to pull out of the deal,” Slavin added.

As I said at the beginning of this broadcast, the two sides are making use of this lull to increase rhetoric and prepare for the war to come.

DOES TRUMP HAVE A MIDEAST PLAN NO ONE KNOWS ABOUT?

From the Wallstreet Journal: What if President Trump’s foreign policy isn’t as impulsive as it may seem? Put aside Korea and trade and consider the Middle East. Mr. Trump’s disregard of orthodoxy could turn out to be exactly what’s needed to sequence a comprehensive strategy for stabilizing the region—and to stanch the flow of Islamist terror to Europe and the U.S. 

The first step has been to forge a working consensus among Israel and its Arab neighbors, aligned to contain Iran and frustrate its dreams of a Shiite crescent through Iraq, Syria and Lebanon to the Mediterranean. Mr. Trump visited Saudi Arabia on his first foreign trip, in May 2017, and has cultivated the new crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, a putative reformer of Wahhabism. 

He has collaborated with the United Arab Emirates and Egypt’s Abdel Fattah Al Sisi, another advocate for reform of Islam, and respected the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, while calling out Qatar for its support of Hamas in Gaza. While none of these nations—except Israel—exemplify American ideals of liberty and the rule of law, they share an interest in fighting Islamist terror and ultimately enlisting U.S. support for better governance and economic opportunities for their young populations. 

The new alliance faces three main challenges: containing Iran’s imperial ambitions and support for terrorist groups such as Hezbollah; stabilizing Syria to finish off Islamic State and foreclose the next iteration of caliphate-seeking terror, while also ending Bashar Assad’s devastation of Syrian Sunni Arabs; and resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The last has become a low priority in the Arab world, but its resolution would liberate Israel to assume a deserved mantle of regional leadership. 

The president was still right to start with the Palestinian file, while consolidating the alliance and working toward consensus goals and strategies for the other two challenges. His recognition of Jerusalem as Israel’s capital codified a truth that must be accepted before Israel and the Palestinians can move forward together. The December announcement was brilliantly timed to confirm, validate and stress-test the new regional alliances.

All the partners stayed quiet or offered pro forma objections, thereby passing the test—except the Palestinians. This was an opportunity for them to express disappointment and to resume negotiations for their own state, with its capital also in Jerusalem. Instead, President Mahmoud Abbas cursed President Trump: “Yekhreb Beitak,”: “May your house come to ruin.” Then, as the embassy was moving last month, Hamas incited border riots in Gaza that killed scores of Palestinians. 

There’s nobody home right now to engage in peace negotiations on behalf of the Palestinians. On the West Bank they are led by the affable but unreliable Mr. Abbas, who is 82 and in the 14th year of his four-year term, continues to propagate base anti-Semitism. He is routinely bullied by subordinates—I’ve seen it privately in person—and is trying to govern from a hospital bed. He has no apparent viable successor. Gaza is controlled by Hamas, a terrorist organization whose charter calls for the destruction of Israel. 

Ordinary Palestinians are desperate for the peace that would integrate them into Israel’s economic miracle, but their illegitimate leadership is worsening their people’s misery to curry sympathy from naive Westerners. Still, Mr. Trump deserves credit for crystallizing the regional alignment that lays a foundation for progress once someone emerges with legitimacy to speak for the Palestinians. 

Next, the president delivered on his promise to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, a move that repudiated his predecessor’s supposed crowning foreign-policy achievement, defied Washington’s foreign-policy establishment, and frustrated America’s European allies. The JCPOA might have delayed Iran’s nuclear program, but it didn’t even pretend to eliminate it. Withdrawing from the deal could be a very good decision—provided it’s eventually replaced with a real nonproliferation regime and an arrangement that contains Iran and its proxies’ terror and mischief in the region.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s May 21 Iran strategy speech articulated the challenge well, but making it happen will require exceptionally smart diplomacy. North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies need to be brought on board lest Iran drive a wedge between them and the U.S.—which could otherwise yield even more serious mutually destructive retaliatory trade wars than seem likely now with China, Mexico, Canada and Europe. 

Then comes the ultimate prize, stabilizing Syria by stopping Mr. Assad’s domestic bloodletting, containing the spread of Sunni extremism, and ideally opening the door for Syrian migrants to return home. The Trump administration is still behind the curve here. Besides launching airstrikes to punish Mr. Assad’s grotesque and illegal chemical drops on his own people, the president has talked about pulling out of Syria “soon,” which would widen the vacuum Vladimir Putin’s Russia is aggressively filling—and for good reason: Syria is the door that must be closed to block Islamist radicalism from reaching Russia from the Middle East. 

A serious approach to stopping the spread of Islamist terror, which should be the highest priority in the region for U.S. homeland security, necessitates that the U.S. stay engaged and develop a real Syria strategy. This could be a huge accomplishment, with the not-incidental bonus of getting the failed “reset” with Russia back on track. Cold War talk is the rage in Washington these days, and Mr. Putin’s thuggish behavior doesn’t help. But Russia, the U.S. and Israel have critical common interests in redressing the spread of Islamism much closer to Russia than America. So far, Israel is alone in cultivating the Russians, with the U.S. out of the picture as Mr. Putin earns credit for constructively rolling back Iranian influence on Israel’s northern border. 

Russia has little affinity for the Iranian ayatollahs, especially with their competing nuclear and energy ambitions—imagine an oil-rich Cuba with nukes. Mr. Putin is in bed with Mr. Assad and Iran for lack of a better alternative. Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Islamist-leaning Turkey can’t be trusted to help insulate Russia, and the U.S. and Europe are understandably hostile to Mr. Putin’s moves in Ukraine and Syria.

There is more to Russia’s and Iran’s alliance. As I have often said, they are blood brothers. However, being “family” doesn’t always mean one agrees with what the brother is doing. This may be the case between Russia and Iran now, but in the end they will see eye to eye and will rescue each other.

Yet Russia needs American partnership, and it’s clearly in everyone’s interest to collaborate toward an alternative to Mr. Assad and Iran for shoring up Syria. The U.S. will certainly have a better chance of restraining Mr. Putin’s misbehavior at home and abroad if it seizes the initiative to stabilize the Middle East with Russia and Israel. This should be high on the agenda for the next Trump-Putin meeting. 

Successfully dealing with Russia and Middle Eastern and European allies could produce a long-overdue realignment of international alliances set in the 20th century’s bipolar rivalry of economic systems, to address rogue nations like Iran and the decentralized, multipolar threats of nonstate terrorists afflicting East and West. Given the initial chaos around the administration’s other international negotiations, this may be a lot to expect. After decades of Middle East failure, though, bold disruption seems exactly what is necessary. Last century’s “experts” have had their turn.

Let’s put this article into Biblical perspective. The political realities are not always seen by pundits, but they almost always miss the prophetic implications. The prophecies of the coming Gog-Magog and King of the North & South wars will be driven less by politics than by ancient grudges.

I believe this article is too optimistic. But I could be wrong. We will have to keep watching.

Now, let’s turn our attention to another optimistic article about Donald Trump and North Korea.

IRAN AND NORTH KOREA: TRICK OR TREAT?

Some foreign policy analysts criticized US President Donald Trump for pursuing a denuclearization agreement with North Korea so soon after withdrawing from the 2015 Iran nuclear deal. 

Iran and North Korea have a shared history of nuclear proliferation. Breaking the convergence between the two nations could be essential for global security. “By happenstance or design, Trump’s initiatives build on the differences between Iran and North Korea,” explains François Godement, director of the Asia and China program of the European Council on Foreign Relations. 

Godement concludes that “If US policy on Iran stays erratic, or becomes so on North Korea, that will embolden the adversaries to a degree not seen before.”

In other words, if Donald Trump is not able to be a good deal maker in North Korea, he will cause Iran and North Korea to put an end to the U.S.’s nonsense.

Global security requires ending proliferation of nuclear weapons technology, custom approaches for nations and immense global cooperation.

President Trump’s effort in North Korea was designed to drive a wedge between Iran and North Korea’s long time alliance. It didn’t work. At least not so far.

The US president expresses hope of signing a denuclearization agreement with North Korea after tearing up the US agreement with Iran, inspiring easy comments on the irrationality of Trump’s foreign policies. Breaking the convergence between North Korea and Iran may prove essential.

The relationship between Iran and North Korean proliferation is deep and longstanding. The parallel between the two nations is real along with the converging connection to Syria. 

Just so you know, Iran doesn’t need to violate the JCPOA because Syria is not part of that agreement. Iran now is the defacto governor of Syria and is the perfect hiding place for a nuclear program.

Like a jigsaw puzzle, Iran and North Korea expose gaping holes in nonproliferation policies. First is the permanent failure to ban development of ballistic capabilities along with nuclear weapons. No UN resolution on North Korea or Iraq has formally declared testing of ballistic missiles as illegal.

Formally, Iran did not demonstrably cheat on the 2015 agreement.  But it has developed a massive ballistic program and presents a regional threat. North Korea is accustomed to cheating yet presents less regional danger. 

Trump’s initiatives build on the differences between Iran and North Korea. For Iran, the missile issue is paramount. The allied US-France-UK strikes on Syria and devastating Israeli hits on underground structures deliver the message that Iran’s missile sites could also be hit. Nuclear weapons without missiles are relics incapable of any use.

Trump must drive a wedge between the two partners to prevent them from helping each other – to prevent North Korea from helping Iran’s nuclear development and to prevent Iran’s ballistic missile technology from being used by North Korea to carry its nuclear warheads.

Israel refused a request from South Korea this week to publicly back the historic summit between US President Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un next week, apparently out of fears the negotiations could set a precedent for future denuclearization efforts against Iran.

Huh? Doesn’t Netanyahu want Iran to be denuclearized? Yes. Then why won’t he publicly support the upcoming summit between the U.S. and North Korea?

Netanyahu said that denuclearizing one State was enough for him.

Whether Netanyahu is a hypocrite or has something to hide is the question on why he doesn’t support Trump’s effort to split North Korea from Iran. The Times of Israel article did not address the reason for Netanyahu’s refusal, but let’s just say that he likely fears that if one State – beyond Iran – can be denuclearized, it will ultimately mean the denuclearization of Israel, too. Israel has the largest nuclear arsenal in the Middle East.

The Iranian saga continues.

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