Iran Israel stand off

The U.N. nuclear watchdog IAEA and Iran failed on 24.08.2012 to strike a deal aimed at allaying
concerns about suspected nuclear weapons research by Tehran, a setback in efforts to resolve the
stand-off diplomatically before any Israeli or U.S. military action.
A flurry of bellicose rhetoric from some Israeli politicians this month has fanned speculation that Israel
might hit Irans nuclear sites before the U.S. presidential election in November.
Tensions rose another notch between Iran and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) when
diplomatic sources said Iran had installed many more uranium enrichment centrifuges at its Fordow
underground site.
While the new machines are not yet operating, the move reaffirmed Iranian defiance of international
demands on it to suspend enrichment and may strengthen the Israeli belief that toughened sanctions
and concerted diplomacy are failing to make the Islamic Republic change course.
The discussions today (24.08.2012) were intensive but important differences remain between Iran
and the U.N. that prevented agreement, Herman Nackaerts, the International Atomic Energy Agencys
chief inspector, told journalists after about seven hours of talks with an Iranian delegation in Vienna.
At the moment we have no plans for another meeting.
Little headway appeared to have been made on the IAEAs most urgent request access for its
inspectors to the Parchin military site where the IAEA believes Iran has done explosives tests relevant
for developing a nuclear weapons capability.
Irans ambassador to the Vienna-based IAEA, Ali Asghar Soltanieh, said that undoubtedly some
progress was made but that differences remained. Because it is a very complex issue issues
related to national security of a member state are something very delicate, the veteran Iranian
diplomat said.But I have to say that we are moving forward and we are going to continue this
process so that we at the end of the day will have a framework agreed by both sides.Soltanieh had
said before the talks began: Both sides are trying to bridge the gap.
The diplomatic sources who revealed the expansion of centrifuge capacity at Fordow also said satellite
imagery indicated Iran had used a brightly coloured tent-like structure to cover a building at Parchin,
increasing concern about a possible removal of evidence of illicit past nuclear work there.
Iran Ignoring World
Israel signalled its patience with diplomacy was fading.

Only yesterday (23.08.2012) we received additional proof that Iran is continuing accelerated progress
towards achieving nuclear weapons and is totally ignoring international demands, Israeli Prime
Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said before the talks ended.
Asked about the outcome of the Vienna meeting, a Western diplomat accredited to the IAEA said: As
dismal as expected. A U.S. State Department official, asked about the revelation of more enrichment
capacity at Irans Fordow plant, said world powers would keep using diplomacy and sanctions to press
Iran into nuclear restraint, but time was running out.
Iran, Israels arch-enemy and the worlds No. 5 oil exporter, says it wants nuclear energy for more
electricity to serve a rapidly growing population, not nuclear weapons, and has threatened wideranging reprisals if attacked.
Nackaerts, the IAEAs global chief of inspections, said before the meeting that the broader goal was a
deal on greater, overall inspector access to answer the U.N. watchdogs questions about possible
military dimensions to Irans nuclear programme.
It was the first meeting between the two sides since discussions in early June 2012 petered out
inconclusively, dashing previous hopes that an accord might be on the cards.
These talks were separate from Tehrans negotiations with six world powers that have made little
headway since resuming in April after a 15-month hiatus, but the focus on suspicions about Irans
nuclear ambitions mean they are still closely linked.
Washington has said there is still time for diplomatic pressure to work in making Iran curb its
enrichment programme, which is the immediate priority of the six powers the United States, Britain,
Russia, China, France and Germany.
Refined uranium can fuel nuclear power plants or nuclear bombs, depending on the level of
enrichment.
Iranian Concession?
Iran says it seeks only civilian nuclear energy. But its refusal to limit and open up its atomic activity to
unfettered IAEA inspections that could determine whether it is purely peaceful, or not, has led to
harsher punitive sanctions and louder talk about possible military action.
Western diplomats had expected no breakthrough but said Iran could offer a concession to inspectors
who want access to sites, officials and documents in hopes of blunting their upcoming quarterly
report on Iran, which is due in the last week of August 2012.

In so doing, Iran would also seek to deflect a planned Western move to have the 35-nation IAEA board
of governors, meeting next month, to formally rebuke Tehran over its failure to cooperate with the
agencys inquiry.
So any Iranian concession should be treated with scepticism, one diplomat accredited to the IAEA
said.
The IAEAs immediate priority remains access to Parchin, even though Western diplomats say it may
now have been purged of any evidence of nuclear weapons research, possibly carried out a decade
ago.
Citing satellite images, diplomats said this week Iran has demolished some small buildings and moved
earth at Parchin. On 23.08.2012, diplomatic sources said the building believed to be housing an
explosives chamber if it is still there had been wrapped with scaffolding and tarpaulin, hiding any
sanitisation or other activity there from satellite cameras.
Iran says Parchin, about 30 km (20 miles) southeast of the capital Tehran, is a conventional military
facility and has dismissed allegations aired about it as ridiculous. It says a broad framework
agreement for how the IAEA should conduct its inquiry is needed before possibly allowing access to
Parchin.
Israeli independence Iranian revolution
From the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 until the Iranian Revolution and the fall of the
Pahlavi dynasty in 1979, Israel and Iran maintained close ties. Iran was the second Muslim-majority
country to recognize Israel as a sovereign nation after Turkey.Israel viewed Iran as a natural ally as a
non-Arab power on the edge of the Arab world, in accordance with David Ben Gurions concept of an
alliance of the periphery. Israel had a permanent delegation in Tehran which served as an unofficial de
facto embassy.
After the Six Day War, Iran supplied Israel with a significant portion of its oil needs and Iranian oil was
shipped to European markets via the joint Israeli-Iranian Eilat-Ashkelon pipeline.Brisk trade between
the countries continued until 1979. Israeli construction firms and engineers were active in Iran.
Iranian-Israeli military links and projects were kept secret, but they are believed to have been wideranging,for example the joint military project Project Flower (197779), an Iranian-Israeli attempt to
develop a new missile.
In spite of all those ties and trades, Iran voted in support of the United Nations General Assembly
Resolution 3379 in 1975 which equated Zionism with racism (the resolution, however, was later
revoked with Resolution 4686 in 1991, which post-revolution Iran voted against).
Other issues between Iran and Israel

Khomeinis comments
During Ayatollah Khomeinis campaign to overthrow Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, Israel, which had
relatively warm relations with the Shah, became an issue. Khomeini declared Israel an enemy of
Islam and The Little Satan the United States was called The Great Satan.
After the second phase of the 1979 Iranian Revolution which witnessed the establishment of the
Islamic Republic, Iran cut off all official relations; official statements, state institutes, events and
sanctioned initiatives adopted a sharp anti-Zionist stance.
According to Dr. Trita Parsi, author of Treacherous Alliance The Secret Dealings of Israel, Iran and
the United States, (Yale University Press, 2007), Irans strategic imperatives compelled the Khomeini
government to maintain clandestine ties to Israel, while hope that the periphery doctrine could be
resurrected motivated the Jewish States assistance to Iran.
Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in December 2000 called Israel a cancerous tumor that should be removed
from the region. In 2005 he emphasized that Palestine belongs to Palestinians, and the fate of
Palestine should also be determined by the Palestinian people. In 2005 Khamenei responded to
President Ahmadinejads alleged remark that Israel should be wiped off the map by saying that the
Islamic Republic has never threatened and will never threaten any country.
On 15 August 2012, during a meeting with veterans of the Iran-Iraq War, Ayatollah Khamenei said
that he was confident that the fake Zionist (regime) will disappear from the landscape of
geography.In addition, on 19 August, Khamenei reiterated comments made by President Mahmoud
Ahmadinejad which the international community and United Nations Secretary General Ban ki-Moon
condemened, during which he called Israel a cancerous tumor in the heart of the Islamic world and
said that its existence is responsible for many problems facing the Muslim world.
Iranian funding of Hamas and Hezbollah
A mural in Tehran, Iran. The mural depicts the emblem of Lebanons Hezbollah, and quotes the
founder of The Islamic Republic of Iran, Ayatollah Khomeini, saying: Israel must be destroyed
Iran supplies political support and weapons to Hamas, an organization committed to the destruction of
Israel by Jihad. According to Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian National Authority, Hamas
is funded by Iran. It claims it is financed by donations, but the donations are nothing like what it
receives from Iran.
Iran has also supplied another enemy of Israel, the militant organization Hezbollah with substantial
amounts of financial, training, weapons, explosives, political, diplomatic, and organizational aid while
persuading Hezbollah to take an action against Israel.Hezbollahs 1985 manifesto listed its four main
goals as Israels final departure from Lebanon as a prelude to its final obliteration. According to
reports released in February 2010, Hezbollah received $400 million dollars from Iran.