It is no wonder that Prime Minister Netanyahu cancelled his meeting with Obama this month.
In part USAToday: WASHINGTON — Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has canceled his trip to Washington this month, prompting annoyance and surprise from White House officials who said they had been working to schedule a meeting with President Obama.
The incident is just the latest outward sign of tension between the two leaders, who also missed out on a meeting a year ago as Netanyahu addressed a joint meeting of Congress to voice his opposition to the Iran nuclear deal. The White House said a meeting then wouldn’t have been appropriate because it was just two weeks before Netanyahu faced a re-election bid.
The dust-up comes as Vice President Biden touched down in Tel Aviv on Tuesday during his week-long visit to the Middle East. He’s scheduled to meet with Netanyahu on Wednesday. The two countries are in the midst of renegotiating a 10-year security agreement.
The White House said the Israeli government first initiated talks about a meeting this month, requesting a meeting of the two leaders March 17 or March 18. The White House had offered March 18 — two days before Obama’s trip to Cuba and Argentina when the trip was canceled.
“We were looking forward to hosting the bilateral meeting, and we were surprised to first learn via media reports that the prime minister, rather than accept our invitation, opted to cancel his visit,” said Ned Price, the spokesman for Obama’s National Security Council. “Reports that we were not able to accommodate the prime minister’s schedule are false.” Full article here.
According to Tasnim dispatches, one of the projectiles launched from a silo on Tuesday was Qiam, a ballistic missile with pinpoint accuracy.
A report broadcast by the state television showed missile silos at seemingly impregnable underground facilities, full of advanced missiles. The underground silos are seen as complementary gear for the IRGC’s underground “missile cities.”
In comments on the sidelines of the drill, codenamed ‘Might of Velayat’, IRGC Commander Major General Mohammad Ali Jafari said the launch of various types of missiles in the exercise was only a slight indication that the IRGC’s missile silos, scattered all over the country, are fully operational. The missile drill has been in progress for a couple of days, but its final stage kicked off on Tuesday in different parts of the country.
According to the IRGC, the exercise is meant to demonstrate Iran’s might and sustainable security in light of unity, convergence, empathy and harmony.
Iran Threatens to Walk Away From Nuke Deal After New Missile Test
FreeBeacon: Iran on Tuesday again threatened to walk away from the nuclear agreement reached last year with global powers, hours after the country breached international agreements by test-firing ballistic missiles.Iran’s most recent ballistic missile test, which violates current U.N. Security Council resolutions, comes a day after the international community’s nuclear watchdog organization disclosed that it is prohibited by the nuclear agreement from publicly reporting on potential violations by Iran.
Iranian leaders now say that they are poised to walk away from the deal if the United States and other global powers fail to advance the Islamic Republic’s “national interests.”
“If our interests are not met under the nuclear deal, there will be no reason for us to continue,” Abbas Araqchi, Iran’s deputy foreign minister, warned during remarks delivered to a group of Iranian officials in Tehran.
“If other parties decide, they could easily violate the deal,” Araqchi was quoted as saying by Iran’s state-controlled media. “However, they know this will come with costs.”
Araqchi appeared to allude to the United States possibly leveling new economic sanctions as a result of the missile test. The Obama administration moved forward with new sanctions earlier this year as a result of the country’s previous missile tests.
Iran’s latest missile test drew outrage from longtime regime critics on Capitol Hill.
“The administration’s response to Iran’s new salvo of threatening missile tests in violation of international law cannot once again be, it’s ‘not supposed to be doing that,’” Sen. Mark Kirk (R., Ill.) said in a statement. “Now is the time for new crippling sanctions against Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, Ministry of Defense, Aerospace Industries Organization, and other related entities driving the Iranian ballistic missile program.”
House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R., Calif.) warned that the nuclear agreement has done little to moderate Iran’s rogue behavior.
“Far from pushing Iran to a more moderate engagement with its neighbors, this nuclear deal is enabling Iran’s aggression and terrorist activities,” McCarthy said in a statement. “Sanctions relief is fueling Iran’s proxies from Yemen to Iraq to Syria to Lebanon. Meanwhile, Khamenei and the Iranian regime are acting with impunity because they know President Obama will not hold them accountable and risk the public destruction of his nuclear deal, the cornerstone of the president’s foreign policy legacy.”
McCarthy went on to demand that the Obama administration step forward with new sanctions as punishment for the missile test.
Meanwhile, the U.S. State Department had difficulty Monday explaining why the nuclear agreement limits public reporting by the International Atomic Energy Agency, or IAEA, on potential deal violations by Iran.
Yukiya Amano, the IAEA’s chief, disclosed on Monday that his agency is no longer permitted to release details about Iran’s nuclear program and compliance with the deal. The limited public reporting is a byproduct of the nuclear agreement, according to Amano.
When asked about these comments again Tuesday, a State Department official told the Free Beacon that the IAEA’s reports would continue to provide a complete picture of Iran’s nuclear program, though it remains unclear if this information will be made publicly available.
“There isn’t less stringent monitoring or reporting on Iran’s nuclear program,” the official said. “The IAEA’s access to Iran’s nuclear program and its authorization to report on it has actually expanded. It’s a distortion to say that if there is less detail in the first and only post-Implementation Day IAEA report then that somehow implies less stringent monitoring or less insight into Iran’s nuclear program.”
While the IAEA “needs to report on different issues” under the final version of the nuclear agreement, the agency continues to provide “a tremendous amount of information about Iran’s current, much smaller nuclear program,” the source maintained.
The IAEA’s most recent February report—which was viewed by nuclear experts as incomplete and short on detail—“accurately portrays the status of Iran’s nuclear program,” including its efforts to uphold the nuclear deal, the official added.
“We expect this professional level of reporting to continue in the future,” the official said.
