by David Suissa, Jewish Journal
The more I get into the Iran nuclear deal, the more it feels like the television show “Mad Men”— you know, those slick advertising geniuses who seduce you with promises but downplay the fine print.
It’s like one of those radio commercials for hot new car deals, where the announcer chokes on his breath at the end while reading the qualifiers: “MSRP excludes taxes, title, other options and dealer charges, higher MSRP will affect lease price, dealer sets actual prices, lessee responsible for insurance, closed-end lease offered to approved customers only through participating dealers, additional charges may apply at lease end, supplies limited, offer ends March 1. See dealer for details.”
Oh my, what a deal.
Well, it certainly reminds me of the Iran deal, which is littered with fine print, some of it quite treacherous. This is particularly ominous when we’re dealing with an evil regime that virtually everyone agrees has a pedigree in cheating and cannot be trusted.
“Anytime, anywhere” was a wonderful promise… until we discovered the qualifier that Iran can delay inspections of its nuclear sites by more than 24 days. In fact, the process is so cumbersome and bureaucratic it can easily stretch out, according to the Wall Street Journal, to three months or more.
Three months or more! That’s like telling a drug dealer you’ll be busting his house next Tuesday at noon. As Jackie Mason noted, restaurants in New York City have a much tougher inspections regime than what we negotiated with Iran, because they can be inspected at any time without any notice.
Why is this issue so critical?
Because a super tough inspections regime was supposed to be our consolation prize for allowing Iran to keep its nuclear infrastructure. If you’ll recall, the original goal of diplomacy was pretty straightforward: America and its partners would make a major concession—the end of nuclear sanctions—in return for Iran making a major concession—the end of its nuclear program.
When we decided to concede to Iran the right to keep most of its nuclear infrastructure, inspections became the decisive deal point. Anything short of ironclad would seriously weaken the deal. Can anyone argue with a straight face that the inspections regime we negotiated is ironclad?
As bad as that is, though, it gets worse.
“Anytime, anywhere” came with another exciting promise: “snapback sanctions.” In combination, these two promises created an irresistible sales pitch: “We’ll surely catch Iran if it cheats, and when we do, the sanctions will snap right back!”
Irresistible, yes, but wait until you see the fine print.
Simply put, in the unlikely event that we ever do catch Iran cheating and try to “snap back” sanctions, there won’t be many sanctions left to snap back to.
Here is how Washington Institute executive director Robert Satloff explains it: “Let’s say that the UN Security Council does order the reimposition of sanctions. According to my read of the agreement, all contracts signed by Iran up until that point are grandfathered in and immune from sanctions. That means one can expect a stampede of state-to-state and private sector contracts — some real, many hypothetical — all designed to shield Iran from the impact of possible reimposition of sanctions, thereby weakening the impact of the punishment.”
In other words, Iran can quickly rack up a slew of deals with Russia, China and Europe worth over $100 billion, and, even if we catch them building a nuclear bomb behind our back, we will have zero power to undo those deals.
I don’t care if you’re Republican or Democrat, this fine print stinks.
The grandfather loophole is especially lethal. After all, once the Persian mullahs make their irrevocable deals, why would they need us? Why should they fear us? It will be difficult enough to catch them cheating– what will restrain them if they’re not even afraid to get caught?
As the emotions are heating up in our community over this deal, I’d like to suggest a less emotional reaction: Stay calm and study the fine print.
I have, and that’s why I oppose the deal. It’s full of nasty surprises. There are many other examples, like the sneaky switch from United Nations Security Council Resolution 1929, which says Iran shall not undertake any activity related to ballistic missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons, to the current deal, which only says Iran is called upon not to undertake such activity. From the mandatory “shall” to the permissive “called upon”— sneaky, indeed.
The Iran nuclear deal may be complex and hard to understand, but, in my book, the real danger is in the fine print. Study it closely. This is not about partisanship or politics. It’s about something we all have in common: We hate getting ripped off, especially by slick Mad Men.
David Suissa is president of TRIBE Media Corp./Jewish Journal and can be reached at [email protected].
In history there have been wars started because of personal vendettas of powerful people.
I think the point of the Iran deal is that the US is going to prevent Israel from protecting itself – which can be understood as a personal victory for Obama in his ongoing duel with Netanyahu.
The truth is that the U.S. and Israel, once two powerful nations that stood side-by-side, are now overrun by Liberal wimps.
Menachem Begin would have sabotaged the Iran nuclear program from day one. Netanyahu and Obama are weak-minded men that are all bark and no bite.
The entire Arab world is exploiting this obvious weakness and laughing in our faces.
too see real change its time for the Jewish community to start paying attention to….yes…Donald Trump…thats right , Trump. He has been trashing this deal since day one, he is now the front runner for the GOP and has said he would restore the positive relationship Israel and the USA once had, which is now destroyed. When he gets into the white House he will scrap this deal. Just watch that man, he loves America, the Jewish people and is surging in popularity and will take the white |House in 16. You heard it here first. Its time for COLIVE… Read more »
it’s a no brainer,the answer is no to the iran deal
All you have to ask yourself is one question; when Obama is negotiating, is it Israel’s best interests on his mind or Iran’s.
It is imposssible to monitor a nuclear program… Period. Even without the fine print. Nobody quite understands how vast a nuclear program is. What are the inspectors gonna do take apart miles of piping systems and tens of billions of dollars of machinery? Get real!
Consider the significance of John Kerry on crutches in the above photo with the Iranians.