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Where Do U.S.-Iran Negotiations Leave Israel?
(Ha'aretz) Ariel E. Levite - President Trump's clear preference is not to attack Iran but to leverage the threat of an onslaught to advance a deal. The regime in Tehran, which has been weakened and is despised by much of its own people, desperately seeks an agreement with the U.S. or at least drawn-out talks that will forestall an imminent attack. The U.S. is believed to be making three demands of the Iranians - ending their pursuit of nuclear weapons, limiting their ballistic missile program, and getting them to stop aiding subversive elements in the Middle East. Regime change is not on the list. Israel doesn't have the power to prevent an agreement between the U.S. and Iran or burden a deal with excessive demands. Moreover, an Israeli attack on the regime or its missile arsenal while negotiations are underway or after a deal is struck will be impossible. Still, diplomatic engagement presents problems. The most pressing is the tension between the Iranians' playing for time in any talks and the Americans' inability to sustain a large military deployment in the region indefinitely. The second is the de facto betrayal of the Iranian people, who have suffered under the ayatollahs' cruel and corrupt rule. Renewed dialogue with the U.S. would accord Iran's leaders a better chance of survival without moderating their hostility toward Israel. The leaders in Tehran can bet that once the Americans lift the threat of an attack and withdraw their forces from the region, it won't be easy to redeploy them. The writer, former deputy director general for policy at the Israel Atomic Energy Commission and head of the Bureau of International Security and Arms Control in the Israel Ministry of Defense, is a Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.