Iran's history of hate for Israel since the 1979 revolution that toppled the Shah, and the policy of the first Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini, has continued unabated until this day. It is a paradox that the P5+1 are about to sign a treaty with Iran in order to ease the crippling sanctions imposed on it. Iran has not been brought to its knees yet and the P5+1 are showing signs of weakness towards Iran when it really should not.
Israel and all the Arab States including the Palestinians are under threat of a possible nuclear conflagration with Iran. Iran's policy of dominating the Middle East cannot be ruled out. It is unlikely that the Sunni Arab States will support Shiite Iran's quest for more influence and domination.
I wish that I could say that the Iranian regime hates Israel because of Israel's occupation of Palestinian lands. This is clearly not the case. Iran does not care about the Palestinians and makes cynical use of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict for their own political agenda of domination and influence in the Middle East.
History has a cruel habit of repeating itself in different contexts. If one were to re-examine history, we see that the same mistakes are made. An evil power will try and woo its potential enemy to make peace so that their evil agenda can be carried out unabated. An example of a big mistake occurred just prior to the World War 2. On 30th September 1938, Prime Minister of Britain at the time, Neville Chamberlain stepped off a plane after having signed a peace treaty with Adolf Hitler. He delivered his famous "Peace in Our Time Speech". Hitler had already embarked on his policies of annihilating the Jewish People, Gypsies and other peoples whom he considered inferior and needed to be exterminated to keep the Aryan race pure. This was a miserable period in British history - appeasement of an evil dictator, by a "peace treaty" that was not worth the paper on which it was written. Britain had embarked on a policy of allowing Germany to carve up Europe "for the sake of peace". There was no discussion about cessation of murder of so-called "inferior races". This was conveniently overlooked by Chamberlain. The parallel here is that Prime Minister of Britain, David Cameron, has made a courtesy call to President Hassan Rouhani (who is Khamenei's puppet) of Iran. Is Britain, like the US and EU, going to be a partner to repeat the same mistake of Neville Chamberlain in 1938? Khamanei is no paragon of human rights in Iran. Have we forgotten Iran's Green Revolution of 2009 when the opposition to the autocratic Khamanei regime was cruelly crushed by his puppet, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad the Holocaust denier? Nothing has changed for the Iranian People in improving human rights. The anti-Israel rhetoric has not ceased. Israel has every right not to trust Iran. The purpose of the Rohani tactic is to ease the sanctions on Iran. However Iran will continue its nuclear programme clandestinely. This can be viewed as a danger to Israel and the Arab World. It is hoped that the soft-serve, pleasant rhetoric of President Rohani is not a cover for something more sinister in the mind of his boss, the Supreme Leader of Iran, Ayatollah Ali Khamanei. His word is the law and President Rohani's placating talk is music to President Obama's ears and the P5+1. Another hint of Iran's "peaceful intentions" is the unveiling of a new drone with claims that it can reach Israel. This drone called "Fotros" is claimed by Iran to have a range of 2000 Km enough to reach Israel and most of the Middle East. A country producing these drones does not do so unless it has an ulterior motive apart from a psychological one. It may be capable of carrying a nuclear warhead. Who knows? Can Israel and Saudi Arabia trust a country like Iran? It has nothing to do with Netanyahu's serious disagreement with the US. It goes far beyond that. If Iran showed signs of compromise and its attitude towards Israel would change to one of recognition, we would be the first to say to the P5+1 "Go for signing an agreement with Iran"! However, this is not the case.
There is a temporary problem in the signing of a treaty with Iran but at the end of the day they will sign. Iran wants to have its cake and eat it. It wants sanctions lifted as well as continue its nuclear programme to produce a bomb. Iran has secret enrichment facilities which will not be open for inspection. We cannot afford to be bluffed by Iran. If Khamenei and his evil secret police organization - SAVAK - are ruling Iran then we have every reason to doubt Iran's "peaceful" intentions. Iran is far from being a paragon of human rights. Its agenda is far from being open. We cannot afford to pander to Iran's whims and fancies.
The Supreme Leader of Iran, Ali Khamenei, is the most powerful authority in Iran. The previous president, Mahmoud Ahmadinajad, was more blunt in expressing his hate for Israel. All the presidents of Iran are subordinate to the Supreme Leader. This is no less true of Rohani. He has to carry out orders from Khamanei even though his tactics differ.
Time will tell whether Iran is trustworthy or not. It is not beyond our suspicion that Iran will hide some of their nuclear facilities from inspectors if there will be an investigation.
It looks as if Iran, EU and the US are on the eve of embarking on a honeymoon in untested waters. Iran still remains hostile to Israel and is engaged in rhetoric against Israel's right to exist.
According to reports in Haaretz, Israel's allies are softening towards Iran, Britain and Italy are examples and this will snowball to include France as well. Naturally this is a worry not only for Israel but for Saudia as well. It could create an interesting scenario of bringing some form rapprochement between Israel and Saudi Arabia, with possible military cooperation between them against Iran.
One of the conditions that should be insisted in the Geneva talks should be Iran's recognition of Israel's right to exist as well as the cessation of nuclear activity before sanctions against Iran are lifted. Unfortunately, this has not been achieved and the policy of appeasement reminiscent of the "Peace in our Time" era of Chamberlain on 30th September 1938.
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