The Iranians stated that they have sent a message to the European Union as a response to their last offer. This message didn’t include any kind of an answer about the nuclear program that Iran is working on. In a smart way the Iranians are trying to keep an opened channel with the world so they won’t lose all the diplomatic channels. World means specifically the West which is struggling with Iran and trying to offer it a good collection of privileges and rewards in order to stop their nuclear program.

The Israeli minister Shaul Mofaz stated in his last week visit to the United States that the world should be aware of the Iranian buying time strategy. According to Mofaz the Iranians are trying to escape from giving any answer concerning their nuclear program because of the elections’ preparations in the United States and the hard political situation in Israel.
In a previous post I mentioned that Iran could be buying time in order to have a chance to go ahead with its program while the west is trying to negotiate with it. From the other side I mentioned too the American policy of gaining legitimate support for any possible force use in the future by probing that it used all of its diplomatic and negotiating tools with Iran without any good result.
Yesterday the Iranians showed a new experiment they did on their new fully Iranian made missile that reaches a distance of three hundred kilo meters in the sea. According to them this is the first experiment on such a kind of missile. The real reason for their new show is to send another capability message with the diplomatic one to prove that they are not an easy target at the meanwhile.
The Iranian will to keep on forward with their nuclear ambitions leaves an impression that it will be hard to defuse the tension with the West through diplomatic channels. Hezbullah, which is considered an ally of Iran, keeps on improving its forces on the borders with Israel; the Israelis showed today a report that includes information about forty thousand missiles that the Lebanese deployed lately close to the southern border of Lebanon.
The departure of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert off the Israeli political scene will affect the future Israeli policies toward Iran, the Palestinians, and Lebanon. The change in the White House will also affect the direction of U.S. policies in the Middle East.
The period between October 2008 and January 2009 will give opportunity for Iran to keep on going forward with their plans, but the question is what will happen after the emergence of the two new governments in Israel and the U.S.

Ziad Khalil Abu Zayyad

A Palestinian-Arab living in East Jerusalem, Ziad graduated from College Des Freres in Jerusalem in 2003. Ziad finished his major in International Relations and English Literature from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Ziad is a former President of the Watan student movement at the university. He is interested in Middle Eastern political issues and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Founder of the Middle East Post and MEL (Middle East Future Leadership Network), he represents Palestinian youth at several international conferences.

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