SETH J. FRANTZMAN
We heard the mantra again and again: “It’s the Iran deal or war”…if we don’t have this deal there will have to be war…if we don’t have this deal Iran will become radicalized…Iran is a pillar of stability in the Middle East…
The only truth about the deal is that the deal is totally unnecessary; Iran won’t change either way, there is absolutely no chance of a “war” with Iran, Iran will obtain nuclear weapons when it chooses to finally develop them (a decision it has postponed for a decade or more), Iran is not a pillar of stability but rather a pillar of instability which has caused 200,000 deaths in Syria, whose support for Assad helped create ISIS, which provided Iran the excuse to further its involvement in Iraq, and that Iran has contributed to more wars in the Middle East in the last two years than at any time since 1979. It is probably the most warlike country in the region, spreading chaos and systematically dismantling and harming Arab nations which will cause increased radicalism, and likely lead to never-ending cycles of conflict here. Iran’s main threat is not to Israel, but actually to the Iraqi and Syrian people. After Iran has digested and colonized those countries, and Yemen, Bahrain and Lebanon, then maybe it will threaten Israel in some minor way. The refugees today drowning and pouring into Europe from Syria, are all a result of Iran’s policies in Syria of supporting the brutal dictator.
Unfortunately many people have come to accept this deadly regime, betraying millions of Arabs and sentencing refugees to their deaths, all with the view that by having a “diplomatic” deal with Iran somehow reverses years of failed US policies…when in reality having no deal would be fine also; and would not give Iran a stamp of approval for its dangerous policies at home and abroad.
Let’s talk about what I call #dayafterthedeal. The hashtag encompasses all the reverberations of the Iran Deal so far.
Seth J. Frantzman - author - analyst 