France's role in scuttling Iran nuclear deal prompts speculation: The halt in talks sets off a debate on whether France was motivated by commercial or geopolitical interests in the Middle East
A marathon round of international talks in Geneva fell short of a widely anticipated deal early Sunday after French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius objected, saying the terms of a preliminary accord were too easy on Tehran.
According to the L.A. Times, Fabius broke an unwritten rule agreed upon by the six countries participating in the talks, the US, Russia, China, Great Britain, Iran, and France, by voicing his opposition to the agreement publicly during an interview with
France Inter November 9, during which he called the accord a "jeu de dupe," which means a fool's game.
Got French diplomacy?
Fabius flipping the middle french fry à la Tehran gave France a badly needed face lift as far as jingoistic John McCain is concerned. During an interview on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's Lateline show February 18, 2003 McCain vitriolically uttered this misogynistic, ageist slur against the French, who warmongers smeared as "cheese eating surrender monkeys" for wanting to give weapons inspectors more time to hunt for those highly hyped, non-existent WMDs before bomb, bomb, bombing Iraq:
They remind me of an aging movie actress in the 1940s who is still trying to dine out on her looks but doesn't have the face for it.
Now that France is with the warmongers, not against them, a smitten John McCain tweets lovingly about his nouveau French amour, who he likely deems "voulez vous dinez avec moi ce soir?" worthy now that this belle chanteuse croons the chorus line of his bomb, bomb, bomb Iran song.
Why did Fabius render the Iran agreement anything but a fait accompli?
‘Israel will attack Iran if you sign the deal, French MP told Fabius’: Paris legislator Meyer Habib, a friend of Netanyahu, called his FM in Geneva to warn of likely response should accord be signed, Israeli TV reports, The Times of Israel, November 10, 2013.
“I know [Netanyahu],” the French MP, Meyer Habib, reportedly told Fabius, and predicted that the Israeli prime minister would resort to the use of force if the deal was approved in its form at the time. “If you don’t toughen your positions, Netanyahu will attack Iran,” the report quoted Habib as saying. “I know this. I know him. You have to toughen your positions in order to prevent war.”
Habib, the deputy president of the Jewish umbrella organization in France, was elected to the National Assembly in Paris in June, to represent the district of southern Europe, which includes French nationals residing in Israel.
“I have known Meyer Habib for many years and he is a good friend to me and to Israel,” Netanyahu said in French in a video of endorsement posted on YouTube in May. Standing next to Habib, Netanyahu continued in Hebrew: “He fights a lot for Israel, for public opinion, and cares intensely about the Land of Israel and Jerusalem, and he has helped me over the years deepen Israeli-French relations.”
And what does John Kerry think about the Iran talks breaking down? On Saturday,
Kerry shot back at the "fool's game" meme:
“We are not blind, and I don’t think we’re stupid. I think we have a pretty strong sense of how to measure whether or not we are acting in the interests of our country and of the globe,” Kerry said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
“We voted for these sanctions in order to bring Iran to the negotiating table,” Kerry said. “Now that they’re there, you have to act in some good faith, and an effort to be able to move towards the goal you want to achieve.”
The US secretary of state directly addressed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s bitter criticism of the emerging deal.
“I’m not sure that the prime minister, who I have great respect for, knows exactly what the amount or the terms are going to be because we haven’t arrived at them all yet,”
That was Sunday, but today, Kerry played Monday morning quarterback, blaming the failure to come to an agreement squarely on Iran, without explaining how the rules of the game had changed in overtime.
Iran rejected nuclear deal, Kerry says, AP November 11, 2013.
‘‘The French signed off on it, we signed off on it,’’ Kerry said.
Earlier reports said that the talks came apart because France refused to accept the deal with Iran. On Monday, Kerry said the major powers reached an agreement after a marathon bargaining session but Iran wasn’t able to accept the deal ‘‘at that particular moment.’’
‘‘There was unity but Iran couldn’t take it,’’ he said.
Iran has consistently denied that their uranium enrichment program aims to create a nuclear bomb. They point out that Iran, unlike Israel, has signed the 1979 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. Iran feels they have a "right" to enrich uranium to 20%, which is well below the 90% required to make a nuclear bomb, and is the level used for peaceful purposes such as developing nuclear energy fuel and medical isotopes for cancer drugs.
Indeed, the assertion that Iran is just about to build a nuclear bomb is based purely on speculation and has been broadly hyped up on the MSM for many years. This propaganda is emanating from the same neocnos who propagandized us about non-existent WMDs in Iraq to successfully fearmonger us into the Iraq War. Keep in mind that Iran, unlike the US and Israel, has not started a war for over 200 years.
Before jumping on the bomb, bomb, bomb Iran bandwagon with John McCain or picking up the check for a fabulous 5 star Fabius dinner for two, do not forget that the Iraq hoax cost the lives of over half a million innocent people. Saddam Hussein had nothing to do with 9/11, wasn't shopping in Niger for yellow cake to manufacture nukes to reduce our cities to mushroom clouds in a matter of 45 minutes, and Iraq didn't hide WMDs on semis driving around in circles.
The Old France knew all of this and paid a heavy price for saying so.
Speaking of fool's games, "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me again, shame on me."