(BESA Center for Strategic Studies-Bar-Ilan University) Dr. Spyridon N. Litsas - The White House seems ready to allow Tehran to pursue its nuclear aspirations by minimizing or eradicating the economic sanctions against it. Yet the Iranian regime is unwilling to emerge from its zone of systemic radicalism. It is comfortable in its religious-ideological isolation. Aggressiveness toward all other regional actors is Tehran's norm. It is odd to trust the Islamic regime with nuclear weapons when its anti-Americanism and anti-Israelism are so clearly central to its philosophy. It is not easy to deter a nuclear power that does not want to be deterred - particularly one that considers itself entitled to behave like a religious and regional hegemon. It would be an enormous mistake for the U.S. to return to regarding Iran as a normal polity that can be trusted. The writer is Professor of Homeland Security at Rabdan Academy, UAE, and Professor of International Relations at the University of Macedonia, Thessaloniki, Greece.
2021-04-08 00:00:00Full ArticleBACK Visit the Daily Alert Archive